For the future of the Earth!
by Edmelon
Summary: Ichigo was glad to be free of aliens, Blue and mew mews. Until now.  When Deep Blue's supporters return, how will Ichigo react when a familiar green-haired alien drops out of the sky once more? For the future of the Earth, I'll be at your service   Nya!
1. New Earth

**Hey! For those who might have read the other 'For the future of the Earth' story also by me, this was a re-write. I wasn't happy with the previous one so I'll be taking more time to write it and making sure its okay (for me anyway). So plz read, review and check out my other stories!  
>Anonymous reviews have been enabled so you can still tell me what you think :P<strong>

Kisshu had his arms resting on the ledge and his head down. Only a week ago had they gotten back to their planet from Earth with the Mew Aqua and for some reason…

For some reason it didn't feel right to be back. For some weird, strange reason he felt like he should be back on earth, even if it was still in its polluted state. Still, he'd get over it. _This _was

his home.

Not that his home planet was all that bad. Thanks to the mew aqua, the surface of the planet was now habitable and their species ventured outside for the first time in thousands of years.

In the short amount of time they'd spent above ground they'd learned that at dusk the normal blue sky turned a hazy green, slowly getting darker and darker until it was black at night. They

had two moons and the usual stars and a nearby sun that glowed a burnt orange colour.

"Kisshu."

Kish lifted his head up and felt the breeze on his face. "Pai."

Behind him the other alien moved closer to the gap in the wall Kisshu leant on. On earth it would be a window, but now was just an open space in the dry walls.

"We are wanted tomorrow by the Deep Blue supporters." He explained, resting one arm on the ledge.

"You mean those obsessed control-freaks who sent us to earth? Well I won't face them."

Pai stood upright. "Kisshu?"

"You heard me. If they sent us to do such a job then knowing them they won't like what we've done one bit. They're just- they aren't happy no matter what we do,

even is that _does _involve saving our, no, _two _races!" Kisshu was getting angry. He looked Pai in the face and felt himself going red with anger.

"You really must control your temper." Pai said in his usual calm voice.

Kish growled at him and focused on the evening sky instead.

Not wanting to stay any longer, Pai left the room. He turned at the doorway. "Oh, and I'll be calling for you in the morning, they won't like it if we're late."

Kisshu didn't even bother to turn round. "Whatever."


	2. Supporters

The round, dark room had a blue tint to everything in it, including the people.

There were seventeen main supporters of Deep Blue's and right now they were all stood on top of a column. Seventeen half-columns were in a semi-circle

towards the back of the room and in the middle of this semi-circle Pai, Taruto and Kisshu were stood waiting to be spoken to.

The supporters themselves all wore a long cloak with a hood. Each cloak was in a dark blue colour and when they lifted off the hoods each supporter had

neon blue streaks in their hair just like Blue had had.

The middle column was tallest and on top of it was the now head of the supporters. Indigo.

"The three of you were sent to the promised planet with a mission."

The three in the centre nodded. "Yes." "Yes," "Yes..."

"The mission: to reclaim the Blue Planet and to help in Deep Blue's awakening. You also had to rid the planet of the vermin now living on its surface and

return Earth to its non-polluted state." The speakers voice rose. "And what happens when you return? You bring back no planet, just the Mew Aqua. And

where is Deep Blue in all this? Our leader, who you obeyed? He's _DEAD did you say? _Pai, what did you often state? Could you please repeat this?"

Reluctantly, Pai eventually sighed and said: "No matter what happens I will follow Deep Blue-sama until the end."

"No matter what happens, _until the end! _What _did _happen to our leader? What happened to Earth? To the humans?"

For a moment there was a silence. Indigo was waiting for an answer. "Well?"

Kisshu took that very convenient moment to lose his temper again. "OUR _LEADER_ NEVER CARED ABOUT US! DEEP BLUE NEVER WANTED OUR PEOPLE TO

BE SAVED! HE ONLY WANTED THE EARTH FOR HIMSELF!"  
><em><br>"Kisshu!" _Tart hissed.

Indigo lifted off his hood. They saw his pale skin, navy coloured eyes and long sandy hair that reached his elbows. In many ways he looked like Deep Blue

himself with only slight colour changes; it came from being the leader of supporters.

His eyes focused on Kisshu. "And this is coming from _you."  
><em>  
>Kish was taken aback.<p>

Indigo continued. "Should I really take this from you? Should I really take all this from someone who _constantly _disobeyed his leader's orders? Who put his

own opinion ahead of Blue's and who really only ever worked for himself? No, I don't think I'll be taking this as reliable from _you._"  
><em><br>"I DID WHAT I DID FOR US! IT WAS ALL FOR THE PEOPLE OF THIS PLANET!" _Kish yelled. He was stood right in front of the column with his fists clenched

and his anger out of control. "Do you think that I didn't care about what was happening back here? All I ever wanted was to save the people back home."

Indigo meanwhile wasn't really paying attention to Kisshu's rant. He spoke calmly as if nothing had happened. "For what you did against Deep Blue, one

would call you a traitor."

Pai and Tart looked at Kish warily. Pai went over and brought him back to the centre before he could yell anymore. He didn't yell, just stood there looking

outraged. Being called a traitor really got to him.

"After all I've done for this race…" he stared at the floor. "I was even killed by our leader. He didn't care… He didn't care."

"Why exactly did you call us here Indigo-sama?" Pai decided to swiftly change the topic.

"I wanted to know exactly why we are not currently on our true home planet."

Tart answered instead. "That planet has its own people now and they _let _us bring back some mew aqua so we could live. Once they'd defeated Deep Blue

they let us go quietly and…" he paused and looked suddenly afraid. He was scared at what reaction was coming from Indigo next. "And we… helped them in

the end."

All the supporters started talking amongst themselves. Indigo frowned. "Silence! You mean to say you let the Earth go?"

Tart looked up. "Yes. We let it go. But we managed to help both planets and both races! This fighting was pointless to start with!"

The talking started up again but this time the leader didn't bother to silence them. He looked at them stunned. "Well. It seems you have failed. We'll have

to take the matter into our own hands."

Now it was Pai's turn to argue. "But we have our own planet now! New Earth is beautiful thanks to the mew aqua, why would you go to destroy and reclaim

Earth when we already have this? This is just like the Earth we know from our time!"

"Silence, Pai! You have failed. We won't."

With that, the three aliens found themselves being teleported out of the room of supporters and into the street. They looked back at the giant domed

building they'd just been in.

There was an awkward moment as nobody was willing to speak first.

After a while Kisshu quietly spoke again. "They still follow Deep Blue after what he did."

"They don't know what really happened." Pai told him.

Kisshu looked down at the scar over his stomach where Blue had speared him. "This can't happen."

"What are you going to do?" Tart asked him.

"I'm going back." He said. Then he smirked like he always used to. "Anyone want to join me?"

**Note: Yes, I do know Indigo is a bad name :)**


	3. Wildcat

**Random note: Please excuse the bunnies :)**

In a strange, strange world, Ichigo saw a background of green-yellow colours that shone and sparkled. Pink bubblegum and purple colour bubbles floated

slowly like they were suspended and bright yellow glittery dots were embedded in the green.

Every so often a _chink! _or a tinkling noise could be heard, like a bell.

Soon there was a silhouette. It was a glowing, bright blue that got closer and closer and bigger and bigger. _Pop! _The blue turned into bubbles which flew

away to reveal… a cat. _Ooh, _that was the Irimote Wildcat. The first time she'd seen one was at the Red Data Animal exhibit on her first date with Aoyama-

kun. That was the day she- wait what was the cat doing?

Now she saw herself come into view. She picked up the cat and just like that day the cat disappeared into her chest, sending bright pink lights out

everywhere.

"Huh!"

Ichigo suddenly woke up and looked around her. She was in her room, in her bed and the daylight from the window was coming through her curtains.

Then she felt worry. _Oh no, no! What if- What if she was turning into a Mew Mew again? _She smiled to herself. How silly, it was just a weird dream probably

brought on by her past experiences.

Ichigo shuddered at the memory. Sure, being with her mew friends was good and all, but some really bad things had come out of being one of them. Cat

ears and tail coming out whenever she got excited, having to fight aliens who wanted to take back earth, the constant threat of a Chimera Anima coming

her way, being stalked by an alien called Kisshu… worst of all she'd had to hide it all from Masaya. She was so relieved when he knew of her secret. She

hadn't had to hide any more.

She decided to waste a minute or two by daydreaming about Aoyama, but instead got a different image in her mind. Deep Blue. Aoyama had been Deep

Blue, their enemy who wanted to destroy the Earth.

She shook the image out of her head. "He's gone," she told herself. "Blue is gone and everything worked out!"

As she got dressed Ichigo did a quick check for cat ears or tail. No, she found no tail and she still had her normal human ears. Phew.

She breathed a sigh of relief and headed off to school.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

Later in the day, Ichigo stepped into the café where the others were already working.

"Are you okay, Ichigo-san?" Lettuce asked her.

"I'm fine," she shook her head.

"What happened onee-chan nanoda? Pudding said in her usual cheerful voice.

She shook her head again even though it was pointless. "I just had to turn down another date with Aoyama-kun."

Ichigo pretended not to notice Mint rolling her eyes and wasting time by drinking tea.

She sighed. "I wish we could have some time off."

Mint rolled her eyes again. "We _had _time off after the aliens left."

"That was three months ago!"

Ryou appeared in the doorway. "No arguing, just get on with work!"

Ichigo turned to him. "Ryou! Why is the café still open? There's no use for it anymore and the aliens have left so why am _I _still here!"

He folded his arms. "We need to make money as well."

She growled at him.

"And I do _live _here you know."

She decided it was best not to argue any more. It never helped.


	4. The aliens have landed!

"Ryou, look at this."

Ryou looked over at the computer screen.

Keiichiro brought and image up onto the computer. "What d'you think this is?"

He leaned in closer. "I- I don't know…"

A satellite image of Earth was being shown. You could see Japan from space and all the islands around it, but the weird thing was a bright white oval

blocking out the Tokyo area. The oval was so shiny it reflected light which made it hard to see.

"What is that?"

"I don't know. It looks like-"

"What?"

"It looks like the spacecraft the aliens left in." Ryou said.

Keiichiro turned away. "You think they'll come back?"

"They have no reason to!"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

"How far are we now?" Tart whined.

Pai sat at the main flying controls. "Not far, a few hours."

Tart groaned. "I can't take this anymore! I hate the journey, it takes too long.

"Taruto, we live on another planet, do you honestly expect it to be a ten-minute flight?"

"But it's boring!"

The small alien made continuous circles in his chair. "Wow these chairs are pretty cool!" he stopped swivelling and turned to Pai. "Why is it I don't have one

of these?"

"Because _you _don't know how to fly a spaceship yet." He told him.

Tart shrugged and began spinning again. Pai sighed. He was used to spending months at a time inside a cramped spacecraft. It had taken two months to

reach here and somehow he'd still kept his sanity, even _with _the other two on board.

He looked at the screen in front of him. "Ten minutes till landing." He turned. "Where's Kisshu?"

Taruto leaned back in the chair. "He was moping about stuff. At least he was when I left him."

"I'm here." Kisshu appeared in the doorway. "Taruto."

"What?"

"Seat."

With a groan, Tart got up out of Kisshu's seat and hovered in between the two aliens.

Right now they could see Japan standing out from the blue ocean and they were fast heading for Tokyo.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

At the end of the school day, Ichigo stayed behind to watch Masaya's kendo practice. She often stayed behind and at least today she'd bullied Ryou into

giving her a day off work.

She sat watching and daydreaming, mostly about him. Today after this they would go to the park by the lake and she couldn't wait!

Ichigo now wasn't really paying attention to what was going on around her; she was too busy in a world of her own with just her and Aoyama...

(l (l  
>(0~0)<br>0(")(")

"_What are you doing?"  
><em>  
>"Trying to find a place to land!"<p>

"Shouldn't that have been done _before _we entered the atmosphere?"

"Kisshu, I know what I'm doing!"

"We never had to land last time!"

Tart was still hovering in the air listening to the argument going on "You might want to land before someone human sees us."

Nobody bothered to answer him; they were too busy trying to find a place to land before they crashed instead.

Pai flicked a few switches on the control panel. "I'm going down there."

Kish snapped at him. "Idiot, we'll be seen!"

"Not with a shield we won't." Pai told him.

After a few moments the entire ship came to a sudden halt and all three aliens were thrown forwards.

Tart tutted and picked himself up off the floor. "Nice landing, Pai!"

"Aaah…"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

Ichigo was unaware of the weird looks and coming her way by the other girls around her; she was _still _in a dreaming state.

"Momomiya-chan!"

She snapped out of her state. "Hi!"

She beamed up at Masaya. She was just unsure of the confused look she was getting.

Ichigo was even _more _confused when he quickly put her hand on her head. "Aoy-Aoyama-kun? W-what's wrong?"

"Can't you tell? Look!"

He pointed to the wall mirror behind her. She turned round and nearly died when she saw what had happened. "AH! _WHAT'S HAPPENING?"  
><em>  
>She put her hands over her newly-formed cat ears, turned round to tuck her tail out of sight and sped out of the gym. Aoyama followed her.<p>

"Masaya! W-what am I going to do? AH!"

He brought her closer to cover the ears. "I don't know. Didn't you only get those when you were a Mew Mew?"

"Yes!"  
><em><br>Why? Why was this happening again? WHY!_


	5. KittyCat!

"SHIROGANE!"

Ugh. Ryou was sat in the café alone at one of the tables. The girls were in the dressing room getting ready to open the shop and Keiichiro was in the

kitchen, at least when they had visitors he could slip away quietly without being noticed.  
><em><br>"SHIROGANE!"  
><em>  
>He tipped his head back over the back of the chair and folded his arms. "Here she comes,"<p>

BAM! Ichigo flew the front doors open and stormed over to him. She put her hands on the table and glared at him. He closed his eyes so he couldn't see her

and waited for it.

"Shirogane!"

"What's up?"

Ryou opened his eyes and saw her face. It was bright red and she was currently staring him out.

"Shirogane," Ichigo began calmly. "Could you please explain to me, just _why _are my _cat ears and TAIL POPPING OUT AGAIN?"  
><em>  
>He shrugged and leaned back in his chair. "I don't know, means nothing to me."<p>

"WHAT!" she screamed.

"I don't know," he repeated, rubbing his ears from her screeching right next to him. "Your mew powers disappeared ages ago, the Red Data Animal DNA

should have vanished by now."

Ichigo sighed and lowered her voice again. Just _why _was he so awkward? "This is _serious, _Shirogane! I can't just go round worrying about my ears coming

out again! What, am I going to start becoming a cat again whenever someone kisses me?"

"It's possible."

She bit her tongue, not wanting to rip his head off for risk of being fired.

Ryou took his hand away from his ear and stood up. "Go get ready; the café will be opening soon." He walked towards the entrance to the basement and

left Ichigo fuming in the room.

As Ichigo walked into the dressing rooms Keiichiro watched with concern. Her Mew ears were appearing again? They should've gone with the aliens.

Shouldn't they?

He abandoned his cooking in the kitchen and went to follow Ryou.

Keiichiro found Ryou slouched in the computer chair. "Ryou?"

He lifted his blonde head. "Keiichiro."

"What's wrong?"

Ryou hesitated for a moment before sighing. "We've got a problem." He stood up off the seat and continued. "Ichigo says her cat ears and her tail have

started to re-appear."

Keiichiro tilted his head slightly. "Maybe the Red Data DNA has imprinted on her own somehow? Any sign of a Mew Mark?"

"I didn't want to ask," Ryou shook his head and smiled. "She'd have killed me on the spot; I couldn't get out of there fast enough."

He laughed. "Ichigo can be pretty lethal, just don't be so harsh on her."

"Who said I was being harsh?

Keiichiro sighed and changed the subject back. "Do you think this could be connected to the ship we saw on the satellite image?"

Before Ryou could answer, he went over to the computer and spent about a minute or so checking for the most recent images of earth.

The image was from that day and like the previous one showed Japan, the sea around it, islands, the capital… but no bright oval.

"Where the heck has it gone?"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

It was just about 5pm and in the kitchen of Café Mew Mew Ichigo helped Lettuce and Pudding wash the plates left over.

She scrubbed furiously. "Aargh!"

"Ichigo-san?"

"Ichigo onee-chan!"

Ichigo looked up at the two faces beside her.

Lettuce was first to speak. "What's wrong Ichigo-san?"

"Onee-chan doesn't seem as cheerful today, nanoda!" Pudding added in a bright, happy voice.

She put on a smile for her friends. "Nothing! I'm fine!" Her smile dropped. "Except…"

Pudding came in closer. "Except what nanoda?"

"Except…" she paused. _Should she tell them? SHOULD she tell them about the cat ears? _"Uh… Have either of you had _weird _things happen to you recently?"

"Like what?"

Ichigo looked at them both. She was the only mew who'd ever had that sort of trouble. Eventually she gave in. "Huh, nothing,"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

After about half an hour of cleaning and tidying up the café, Ichigo walked back home with Lettuce and Pudding.

"Why couldn't Mint have given us a lift home?" Lettuce complained. It was quite unusual for Lettuce to complain, but Ichigo didn't blame her. Mint was such

a snob she never allowed them in her limo that she took home and would only offer Zakuro a ride.

"But Pudding likes walking, nanoda!"

Lettuce smiled at Pudding as she bounded along ahead of them. "At least Pudding-san is having fun."

Ichigo cheered up slightly. "Yes!"

Walking in the fading light with her friends made Ichigo much happier. She was beginning to forget about her ears, tail and her life as a Mew Mew and she

felt much better when she did. She just hoped she could continue to forget about it.

But unfortunately for Ichigo, someone was about to make life a whole lot worse for her.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

It was nearly dark and after saying goodbye to Lettuce and Pudding, Ichigo made her way home.

She was still feeling pretty good and was looking forward to the Sunday, which was only two days away from now. That was when she wouldn't have to go

back to work and could just spend the day at home; maybe even plan something with Aoyama.

She walked along and thought about daydreaming about the possible dates she could go on with him, but didn't want to risk her ears to pop out again in

public so had to decide against it.

There wasn't anyone else around and she _was_ alone so she _could _let her ears and tail go out unnoticed, but there was no telling how long they'd stay there.

Besides, her mother might see them when she got home.

Ichigo sighed and carried on. Suddenly, in a puff of pink, her phone-charm Masha became life-sized again.  
><em><br>"Ichigo! Alien! Alien!"_

"Huh?"  
><em><br>"Alien! Alien!"  
><em>  
>Masha continued his warning, flapping his little arms around. Ichigo spun round, expecting to see someone behind her, but there was no one.<p>

"Good to see you again!"

A familiar voice came from behind her. She spun back but there was still no one there, looking up… She should've guessed.

"Isn't this where we first met?"

From the tall roof of a building, Kisshu leapt off. Before Ichigo could say anything he was so close she could see herself in his golden eyes and she felt his

moss-green hair on her cheek.

"AH!" she pushed him back before he could get her.

Kisshu floated in front of her. "Oh, _prepared _this time are we, kitty?" he said. "I didn't even get a kiss this time!"

"Kisshu!"

Ichigo was in a state of shock. She thought she'd never see this face again! What was going _on?  
><em>  
>She tried to speak normally. "K-kis-shu, w-what are y-you doing here?"<p>

He stopped hovering and stood like a proper person. "Ichigo." He smiled. "You're still here."

Ichigo frowned. Why didn't he just answer the question? "What do you mean?"

"I never said goodbye, never got to see you alive again."

She was slightly taken aback. Wasn't Kish usually creepier than this? "If you think I'm going back with you, you are _sadly _mistaken!" she stated.

"I'm not here to take you back this time." Kisshu told her. "I've come back to tell you something."

"Oh, please, not this again! No!"

He smirked. "I'm not gunna say _that, _kitty."

Ichigo started to get scared. "Then what?"

"I need to talk to that blonde from your café."

"What? You mean Ryou?" she asked. What did he want with Ryou?

"Whatever his name is, Pai needs to talk to him, only Pai doesn't know I'm out so _sshh_! Just thought I'd give you a bit of a warning kitty-cat."

"Pai?"

Kisshu started hovering again and moved higher into the air. "Yeah. We'll be seeing you tomorrow at your cutesy café. Oh, and say hello to Romeo for me."

With that, Kisshu teleported away and left Ichigo stood there in a state of shock, fright and confusion. _Why was he back?_


	6. Return

The next day Ichigo went to work at the café. It had to be the first day since she'd started there that she wasn't late.

When she came out of the dressing room in her uniform Ryou was very surprised to see her at all.

"Ichigo!" he crossed his arms and looked at her curiously. "I didn't think you'd be coming in."

"And why not?" she asked brightly, positioning herself behind the till.

"Well because of the whole ear-tail experience."

"Oh," she felt herself going slightly red. "Well, umm…" Could she tell him the real reason? Could she tell him that she'd only come extra-early to see what

would happen today? That she'd met Kisshu? That _he _had told her they would be here today? No.

Ichigo shrugged. "I figured I can keep them hidden for long enough."

Ryou didn't look too convinced but he nodded and left the room. Ichigo breathed a sigh of relief; she didn't want him constantly watching her like that.

"Oh, what's gotten into _you?_"

Ichigo turned to see the others arriving. Mint was looking at her with a pretend concern face. "Aren't you usually the last one here?"

She glared at Mint. "Well at least I actually do something around here!"

Mint opened her mouth, but quickly shut it and headed for the dressing rooms with her nose in that high snobbish way.

Feeling quite proud for silencing Mint, Ichigo went to help sorting out the chairs before the café opened.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

Ryou sat in the dark basement. He was examining days and days of past satellite images for that shining oval.

He sighed and pushed back his hair. This was all very confusing. Over the past week it had been getting bigger and bigger and closer to Earth and now it

was gone. Vanished into thin air. Had it really been an alien ship? Had they really come back?

"Hey! Bet you didn't see this coming!"

Ryou practically leapt out of his seat and turned to see three aliens who teleported into the basement. Pai, Kisshu and Tart stood there looking at him.

"What do you three want?" Ryou demanded furiously.

Tart was about to speak when Kisshu interrupted him. "Well our home isn't doing so good; we thought you'd like to hand Earth over without any fuss."

Pai gave him a look. "Will you stay quiet for more than two seconds? Stop talking such nonsense."

Then he turned back to Ryou. "We need to talk. Your planet is in danger again."

()()  
>(0.0)<br>(")(")

Keiichiro called through the kitchen. "Could someone open the café?"

Obediently, Lettuce went to put the sign up outside the shop.

"Lettuce!"

She stopped and turned back, looking like a deer in the headlights. "Yes! Shirogane-san!"

Ryou came up from the basement. The girls looked at him confused. "We shan't be opening today."

Ichigo held up the empty tray she was carrying. "Why not?"

"Because of this!"

"AH!"

Ichigo shrieked as Kish teleported right in front of her and pulled her close. "How're you doing kitty cat?"

"AH! KISSHU! GET OFF ME!"

He smirked. "Aww, my little kitty's still as vicious as I remember!"

Ichigo struggled and eventually managed to push him away… but unfortunately her cat ears and her tail came out in the process. She felt herself going

bright red and she put a hand over one even though it wouldn't do much good. Her embarrassment turned to anger as he started laughing again.

"Kisshu!"

He _stopped _laughing when the other two aliens appeared in the café.

Pai frowned at him. "Can you not take anything seriously?"

Kisshu joined the other two and folded his arms. "Relax. I'm just catching up with old friends. I'm sure given half the chance you and the porpoise would do

the same thing."

In the background Lettuce went pink. Pai looked at her then looked back. "Even if I knew Mew Lettuce…"

Mint sighed and rolled her eyes. "Could we _please _get to the point? Like: Why on Earth are three aliens stood in the café and why is nobody here seriously

_shocked?"  
><em>  
>Keiichiro took that moment to walk in. "That is a very good question."<p>

"TARU-TARU!"

Tart was busy hovering over a table when Pudding noticed him. "Oh no,"

"TARU-TAR_UUUUU! _YOU CAME BACK! PUDDING FINALLY HAS HER FRIEND BACK, NANODA!"

Pudding rushed over to the table as Tart floated away and eventually grabbed hold of him. She must've crushed him in her hug, but soon Tart stopped

struggling. Kish, meanwhile, was dying of laughter in the background.  
><em><br>"Not in front of the other two!" _Tart hissed at her and she let go with a bright smile.

Zakuro ignored Pudding and Tart. "Why are you here?" she asked in a serious voice.

Pai sighed. "I'm afraid your planet needs you to become Mew Mews again."

"That makes no sense!" Mint said loudly.

He ignored her. "After Deep Blue's defeat we headed back to our planet and released the power of the Mew Aqua into the atmosphere. Since then our home

planet has been just as precious as Earth and for the first time in thousands of years we have been able to live above ground. Even though we didn't return

with Earth people have been happy to have somewhere stable to live."

"Except Deep Blue's followers." Tart added. "They were the ones who sent us here to destroy Earth the first time. They still think we deserve Earth and

because _we _failed they're heading back to finish humans off themselves!"

Keiichiro took a deep breath before speaking. "Any idea what they're going to do?"

Pai shook his head. The room went horribly silent.

"We've come back to warn you _and _of course to help." Kisshu broke the silence. He grinned at Ichigo. "Looks like we're gunna have to work together, Kitty!"

Ichigo tried to hide a groan. _Why?_

Ryou tried not to smile. "So, was it _your _spaceship that was showing up on the satellite photographs?"

As usual Pai spoke before the other aliens. "Yes, unfortunately our ship also was damaged during landing." He then stared at the other two aliens as a

warning: Do Not Say ANYTHING!

"S-so, we may have to fight again?" Lettuce said in her nervous, quiet voice.

"It seems so." Ryou told her. "Alright, we'd better be on the lookout for _anything _and until the damage on your ship is fixed you can stay in the spare rooms

here if you like."

Ichigo gave Ryou evils. _Why! _Now she'd have to put up with Kisshu _every day _at work!


	7. Chimera Anima

"You missed a spot, koneko-chan!"

Ichigo grumbled and angrily put the mop back down on the floor, sending water droplets and bubbled flying everywhere.

Kisshu was sat sideways on the chair and leaning backwards. Only they were in the room and every so often he would tease her cleaning.

She paused and stared at him. "Kisshu, have you got nothing better to do than to just sit there and shout at me?"

"I think Pai has made it perfectly clear that I'm not wanted downstairs."

Ichigo muttered under her breath. "I wonder why…"

Ryou, Keiichiro and Pai were currently in the basement discussing satellites, aliens and technical ways to repair the ship… basically boring things. Kish had

been so bored down there he'd been sent out by Pai for commenting once too often and now was finding amusement in annoying Ichigo.

"And I'm not too keen on joining the others." He went through what annoyed him most about everyone in the café. "The birdbrain's too snobby; the

porpoise is too shy, the monkey's too hyperactive even for a child, wolf-girl is a bit of a loner…"

Ichigo sighed. How long would it take for them to leave? Why did she have to work with him?

She put her mop in the bucket and leaned on a table. "Kisshu, did you come to Earth to help or just to annoy me?"

Kish stopped going through the people and shrugged. "You may be surprised to find that I didn't come to Earth just for you, Ichigo."

Great, she wished she hadn't asked now. His shiny, golden eyes were staring right into her.

"I came here because even though I _despise _humans, I know that some of you are decent. You being here was just a plus!"

"Some of us are decent? This is _not _the Kisshu I know!" she said, reminded of the many times he'd tried to destroy them.

"That was when I was Deep Blue's servant." Kisshu twisted to sit properly in his chair and then sighed.

Suddenly Ichigo felt sad. She remembered how Deep Blue treated the people who worked for him. She remembered when Kish had tried to protect her and

had ended up being killed by his leader. She remembered holding Kisshu when he died. Ichigo looked at the alien opposite her and noticed the huge scar on

his skin that Blue had made.  
><em><br>No! Oh no! _Was that… was that a _tear _forming in her eye? When she was sure Kish wasn't looking she wiped it away. He always had a thing about her

crying.

"Momomiya-san!"

Ichigo looked at the entrance to the café and saw Masaya standing there.

"Is the café shut?"

Instantly she cheered up and went over to him. "Aoyama-kun!"

Masaya went to hug her but then saw Kisshu sat at a table. "You! Alien!" He backed away in fear. Kisshu smirked. He'd tried to kill Masaya how many times

now? "Relax, Romeo. I come in peace." He laughed at his little joke and put his feet up on the table.

"Aoyama-kun, it's okay!" Ichigo reassured him. "It's okay," She led him away from the tables so they could speak together.

Once he'd gotten over the alien – and once Kish decided it wasn't worth talking to him anymore – Aoyama smiled at her.

Ichigo smiled back. How was it that from sad memories she went to happy ones? She was reminded of how unbelievably delighted she always was to see

his smile again! How relieved she felt that after what happened 3 months ago she could still see Aoyama-kun's smile!

"So, Ichigo-san," he began.

"Yes!" she said excitedly.

"I wondered if you would like to come with me to a new park tomorrow."

She tilted her head slightly. "New park?"

"Well after all the cleaning up and environmental work I've been helping out with, this place is now doing brilliantly, you'd hardly ever guess it was once

polluted!" he showed her a picture that included a wide, clean, shining lake and the usual park benches and trees, flowers, healthy grass and foliage…

Ichigo looked at it with interest and nodded. "Of course! I'd love to! What time?"

Masaya was pleased she'd said yes, Ichigo could tell by the look on his face. "How about 13:00? That way we'll have a full day."

Nodding again, she made a mental note of it: _Saturday at 1 o' clock, got it!_ "I'm looking forward to it already!"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

"There simply isn't one!" Keiichiro said in frustration.

"Damn it!" Ryou muttered.

Pai shook his head. "They _must _have reached Earth by now; they left about the same time as us. I just wish the journey wasn't so long."

Ryou nodded. "They've had time to prepare…"

Whilst they scanned the images of Earth the computer started bleeping.

"Huh?" Tart said. "What's that?"

Keiichiro took away the images. "That's…"

A map of Tokyo appeared and centred on a place in the city. There was a pulsating red dot.

Pai recognised it instantly. "Chimera anima!"

Ryou headed towards the staircase. "Where are the girls?"

"Kitchen, last time I checked."

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

When Ryou made it out of the basement, Ichigo and Masaya were still busy chatting and laughing and Kisshu was busy rolling his eyes everytime Ichigo

made a girly giggle at her boyfriend.

"Ichigo!" he yelled. When she heard him she obviously wasn't pleased. "City centre! We've got a Chimera Anima!"

"What?"

Kish slouched down further in the chair. "I'm afraid we're going to have to drag you away from your date, kitten."

He was responded with a fierce glare.

"We don't have time for this!" Ryou snapped. "Keiichiro!"

The others who had been in the basement appeared in the café.

"Yes?"

"Go fetch the other girls; we need to get there as fast as possible."

Whilst he was busy, Masaya grabbed Ichigo and turned her to look him in the eye. "Momomiya-san, what's going on?"

"Ummm," she wasn't quite sure how to say this. She also wasn't aware of what was going on around her. The girls appeared in the room.

"Ichigo! We have to hurry!"

"Tokyo Mew Mew!" Ryou told them. "Sortie!"

She moved away from Aoyama. That was it… She couldn't stop it.

"MEW MEW STRAWBERRY!"

"MEW MEW MINT!"

"MEW MEW LETTUCE!"

"MEW MEW PUDDING!"

"MEW MEW ZAKURO!"

"METAMORPHO-SIS!"

"I'm sorry, Aoyama-kun!"

Ichigo made her apologies. Fully transformed, she needed to go, but Masaya was holding her back. "ICHIGO! You're a Mew Mew again aren't you? A MEW

MEW!" he yelled.

"Aoyama-kun?"

He had a hold of her arm and was staring at her furiously. _"THIS POWER SHOULD HAVE GONE! THIS IS TOO DANGEROUS! YOU REMEMBER WHAT_

_HAPPENED LAST TIME!"  
><em>  
>She felt a tear come to her eye. "No! Aoyama-kun! <em>Please!"<br>_  
>He was about to have a go at her some more, when Keiichiro came over. "Masaya, she has to do this for the future of the Earth."<p>

Masaya's usual calm face turned to shame and he let go of his grip. "You're right. I'm sorry, Ichigo. Just go."

No! Now she felt bad! He looked so- so ashamed and disappointed at the same time. But she had to go. With a groan, she went out with her friends.


	8. Kiko

In amongst the tall buildings and roads, cars and people a gigantic chimera anima was causing chaos right in the heart of Tokyo.

The jellyfish-like parasites had chosen some type of lizard for their mutation, so now there was a huge Chimera Lizard roaming the streets.

The lizard had the ability of some sort of camouflage and the body was made up of different sized plates: big plates to cover large areas with smaller,

curvier plates around other areas such as the face and joints. Its eyes were slightly sunk into the head and there was a crest on its head with sharp points

going all the way down its spine.

The Mew Mews and the aliens reached the anima to find all sorts of damage that had been done. Cars had been left in the street and tossed to the sides;

some cracks were in the pavement and roads where the anima had stomped around…

"This seems pretty harmless." Mint stated.

"Don't underestimate it." Zakuro warned her in a usual calm but serious tone.

Mint looked at her in admiration.

Tart spoke up. "Who's _that?"  
><em>  
>The team looked up and saw above the lizard someone floating. They couldn't tell who it was, but they could clearly see the pointed alien ears that stuck<p>

out.

"A-Alien!" Lettuce said.

Pai called his weapon fan and held it toward the figure. "TELL US WHO YOU ARE!"

"I've been waiting for this, Pai!"

The figure floated lower and came closer and when he spoke his voice was deep and slightly wheezy. He had the supporter's cloak, a neon streak in his

blonde, spiked hair and hazel eyes like Tart's, only duller. He was one of Deep Blue's.

Kish looked at the alien in front of them. "Kiko."

"You know this alien?" Zakuro asked.

The alien summoned his sword. "Kisshu. I see you're still alive, why is that? Indigo was speaking of hanging you for a while, along with the rest of these

pathetic Earthlings."

Mint frowned. "Who you calling pathetic?"

"Mint!" Zakuro said sternly.

She backed down. "Sorry oneesama."

Kisshu clenched his fists together. "Why am _I _always the one to get the blame?" He held his arms in an 'X' to summon his zai swords.

Kiko chuckled and shouted at the Chimera Lizard. "GO! CHIMERA ANIMA!"

The eight of them scattered into different positions around the anima as the fight began.

Mint lifted Pudding up in the air.

"RIBBON! PUDDING RING… INFERNO!"

In a mass of orange jelly, the anima was frozen on the spot. Pudding and Mint landed on their feet and safely on the ground.

"Now Lettuce!" Mint called.

"RIBBON… LETTUCE RUSH!"

The Lettuce Rush raced towards the anima, but before it could reach it the lizard burst free of its seal and turned, narrowly missing the rush which was

wiped away by Pai's fan. Good thing Lettuce knew he couldn't see her smiling at him.

As it turned, the giant lizard's tail swooped around. Ichigo jumped over it and just missed it. That tail was flexible and incredibly thick, so they had to be

extra careful to avoid it.

"RIBBON! ZAKURO SPEAR!"

Zakuro's cross unleashed a purple stream of light that caught the lizard around the neck and held it there. "Make it weak!" Zakuro was asking everyone to

injure it whilst it was held down.

Before anyone could attack, the lizard pulled itself back and swung its head sideways. Because Zakuro's whip was still around it, she was also dragged into

the air and was flung across the street. She landed unconscious in the cracked road.

"Oneesama!"

"Mint!" Ichigo yelled as Mint went to help Zakuro. "She's fine, she's out of the way at least, stay here!"

Mint hesitated but eventually decided to stay.

This was perfect; they now had no way to trap the creature without the whip.

"RIBBON… MINT ECHO!"

The creature swung its tail and turned in pain as the glowing, pink echo hit it in the shoulder.

They kept using their attacks with the help of Tart and Pai. Meanwhile Kisshu had become locked in a battle with Kiko in the air. Kish threw his dragon

swords downwards, clashing with Kiko's twisted sword and their weapons pushed on each other.

"You know, Indigo was right." Kiko smiled evilly. "You really are a traitor!"

Kisshu sent out a yell of anger and swung his swords to try and hit his opponent. The alien suddenly took his sword back over his head, making Kisshu lose

his balance and fly head-first forwards. Kish spun back up just in time to resist the attack coming his way. He concentrated hard on pushing against the

sword, but it wasn't easy. He might have been skilled with zais, but Kiko was a hell of a lot stronger and his sword was heavy and probably an inch thick of

solid metal.

Down on the ground the Chimera Lizard sent out its tail again and swept Lettuce, Pudding and Mint across the street. Their bodies were now badly hurt by

the anima and because mainly their legs had been hit they had trouble standing.

Taruto looked down at Pudding who was lying on the curb. He turned to the anima. "Ho-Rai-Den!"

The two red orbs and string flew through the air, hit the lizard's face and then came back to him. Once he knew the lizard was hurt, Tart came out of the air

and went to help Pudding. Pai watched and smiled a little at them, but only for a second or two; Pai never showed his true emotions.

He held up his fan. "FUU-RAI-SEN!"

A blast of wind hit the anima and it stumbled onto the ground slightly.

Pai saw Ichigo on the other side facing it. "Try it now, Mew Ichigo."

She nodded and held out her hand. "Strawberry Bell!"

Above ground, Kiko saw Ichigo call for her Strawberry Bell. "Oh no you don't!"

He pushed Kisshu and his swords away. They flew from Kish's hands and disappeared.

"RIBBON… STRAWBERRY CHECK!"

A beam of light burst out and into the lizard's face. Now for the one to finish it off.

"RIBBON… STRAWBERRY…"

Kiko, distracted from his war with Kisshu, ordered the anima. "CHIMERA ANIMA! MAIN ATTACK!"

Obedient to its creator, the lizard even though it was weakened, opened its enormous mouth and let out its tongue.

Ichigo saw the tongue's edges were razor sharp and ran back as far as she could. She found herself backed up against a wall with a forked tongue trapping

her. She could easily have room to wriggle out; she just didn't want her head to get sliced off or anything.

Kiko looked at her with evil eyes. "Chimera anima… finish her off."

Ichigo couldn't help but gasp. Come on, she _could _be about to die!

"Need a little help, kitty?"

She wasn't sure whether to be annoyed at him or glad that Kisshu suddenly came to help. He teleported into the gap between her and the start of the fork.

Kisshu looked behind at her and grinned before holding his arms out for his dragon swords. He quickly brought each sword in each hand down and cut right

through the fork on both sides.

The anima was in pain and had its mouth open while it retracted its tongue.

Kish spoke to Ichigo before teleporting out of her way. "Now! Now's your chance!"

"Understood." She said back and stood in front of the open mouth. "Strawberry bell!"

"RIBBON STRAWBERRY SURPRISE!"

There was a wave of glitter and sparkling pink light… and the anima was gone. Masha popped into the air and swallowed the jellyfish in his mouth. _"Collect!"  
><em>  
>Ichigo rushed over to her friends now the fight was over. They all seemed to be fine, just a little bruised and Zakuro was coming round from her fall.<br>_  
>BEEP BEEP!<br>_  
>Ichigo's mew pendant started bleeping and flashing. She heard Keiichiro's voice through it. <em>"Good work. I haven't detected any more Chimera Animas so<em>

_come back to the café."  
><em>  
>"Understood." She replied. "Oh! Uh wait!"<br>_  
>"Yes?"<br>_  
>"There was an alien here."<br>_  
>"An alien?"<br>_  
>"Yes, he seems to be one of Deep Blue's."<p>

There was a pause. _"Come back to the café, we'll discuss this later."  
><em>  
>The pendant stopped flashing and they made their way back to Café Mew Mew.<p>

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(") (")

"It seems Pai, Kisshu and Taruto have made it to Earth."

Out of the darkness their leader's voice rose. "WHAT?"

"They came to the fight with the Mew Mews, they seem to be working _with _those stupid Earthlings."

"Was your anima strong enough to withstand attacks?"

"Yes, Indigo-sama. It only failed due to the other three's help."

From the dark Indigo stepped forward. "We must do whatever we can to put them out of the picture. They and the Mews must be extinguished."


	9. Spying

Down a little path surrounded by trees and open spaces of grass, Ichigo and Masaya sat down on a bench. She was trying to talk to him about the mew

mews.

Kisshu smirked. He didn't seem to be easy to talk to, what with his sudden rants about the environment that came at the most random of times. He hadn't

done one yet, but it was coming.

Kish was stood on a tree branch and leaning against the trunk. He was on the tree opposite them, but they still couldn't spot him. It was late afternoon and

the sunset sky was slowly fading. This made visibility poorer than normal so they couldn't see him watching them for light and leaves.

Ichigo tried to talk to him. "Aoyama-kun, I _have _to do this! This is for everything on Earth, without us all living things _will _die and the aliens _will _take over

Earth for themselves."

He didn't say anything. She came in closer. "You love the Earth, you care about the environment so why is it so bad that I protect it?"

"You'll get hurt again." He told her. "You were only lucky last time!"

Ichigo wasn't sure what to say. "If I hadn't gone after Deep Blue the entire Earth would have been destroyed. We saved everyone on this planet, so was it

such a bad thing?"

Masaya shot her a look, but thought better not to say anything. Instead he started on about the environment again. "Don't say it was for the environment.

The only reason I feel so strongly about it was because I _was_ Deep Blue."

She looked him in the eye. "No! You were _not _Deep Blue! He created you!"

"I was part of him! That is why I didn't know who I was! That's where my environmentalism comes from and that's where my hatred for humans comes

from!"

Ichigo moved back slightly. "Aoyama-kun?"

"I didn't mean it like that. I just hate what we've done to the Earth."

Ichigo smiled. "Yes, and I can help that! I can help the Earth! That's part of what the Mews are for!"

From his tree Kisshu huffed. Where exactly was this going?

"That was _not _your fault! You have a proper life now!"

"I'd hardly call it 'proper'!" Masaya said back to her. "After what happened I wouldn't call it proper."

Kish did his best to cover a yawn. Hadn't she gotten rid of this guy yet?

"You always were slightly stalker-ish weren't you?"

Kisshu looked behind him. The trees lined a tall brick wall and on the top of that wall stood the one person he'd never wanted to see again. "Kiko,"

This was all he needed right now, Kiko was gunna let Ichigo know he was there for sure.

"Why are you here?"

The blonde alien grabbed his sword. "We simply can't have you ruin this for us, Kisshu. This is our promised planet and we'll do _anything _to get it back!"

He swung his sword, the blades cutting off small twigs as they went and he leapt off the wall. Kisshu collected his zai. "Dragon swords!"

There was a clang as the metals collided.

"We _need _this planet. We _own this planet!"  
><em>  
>"We have our own; after all I did for <em>our race!"<br>_  
>Kisshu went to stab Kiko, who immediately dodged and turned to the side. Kiko put his sword up to Kish's face. <em>"You care too much for these humans!"<br>_  
>He didn't reply. Kiko carried on. "You've grown to care. What a mistake." Then he grinned. "A FATAL MISTAKE!"<p>

The sword came down and narrowly missed Kish's side. Instead it hit the branch and Kish found himself floating.

The fallen branch caught Ichigo and Masya's attention.

She wasn't sure whether to be scared or outraged. "KISSHU!"

At the sound of her voice he tried not to get too distracted. "Sorry about this, kitten!"

Ichigo went red with anger. _He… He was following us!  
><em>  
>Aoyama grabbed her hand. "Ichigo-san, we have to get out of here!"<p>

She turned to him. Confusion was all over her face. "Huh?"

"I don't want to get involved in this." Masaya replied seriously.

The grip he had on her hand was tight, but Ichigo wasn't going to give in. "I'm not going to let him get hurt!"

Masaya frowned at her and ignored the clashing going on in front of them. _"WHAT?"  
><em>  
>Ichigo pulled her hand away and spoke fiercely. "Listen, Aoyama-kun! Kisshu may have done terrible things in the past, but in the end he defended me from<p>

Deep Blue _AND _from what I'm told the rest of you wouldn't have made it out of the base without their help!"

Aoyama was stunned. He watched as Ichigo grabbed her Mew Pendant. "It's only right I return the favour!"

"MEW MEW STRAWBERRY! METAMORPHO-SIS!"

Ichigo put her feet on the ground fully transformed. She glanced back to where Masaya was stood, but instead saw him wandering away down the path.

"Aoyama-kun!"

She sighed. There was no time for that. Kisshu was currently stood on the grass with his zais pushing up the giant sword. Kiko held his sword down and was

hovering above. "This is it Kisshu! Prepare to DIE!"

Slowly, he lifted the sword up and put a foot down on his opponent's chest to make sure he didn't get off the ground. Any moment now it would come

rushing down and Kish would have no way to dodge it in time.

Ichigo raced towards the spot. "Strawberry bell!"  
><em><br>"HHHAAAAAAAA!"  
><em>  
>Kiko brought the sword down. Kisshu led there waiting for it, but then…<p>

Ichigo stood by Kisshu and her Strawberry Bell let out a pink shield. Because he was not properly in the shield, Kiko was repelled and he lifted his foot and

backed away. The light shone and was blinding him. Kiko grumbled and teleported away.

Once he was gone, Ichigo put away her bell and helped Kisshu off the floor.

"Thanks, kitty. That could've ended badly." He said, brushing at the spot on his shirt where Kiko had pinned him down.  
><em><br>"What did you think you were doing?" _Ichigo yelled.

He smiled and patted her hair. "Just looking out for my little kitty cat!"

Ichigo took away his hand. "I would appreciate it if you didn't spy on me and Masaya in the future!"

"Relax, I won't. Where did your little boyfriend go anyway?"

"Huh?" she looked back down the path and lowered her head. "Oh, he- he's gone…"

"Hm." Kisshu shrugged. "We'd better get going if he's not about."

She was still moping over Masaya when Kish teleported away. She sighed, changed back from her Mew self and slowly walked home.


	10. The Supporter's Ship

In the large meeting room on board the Supporters' ship there were seventeen chairs in a semi-circle just like the columns on their home planet. Each navy

chair was egg-shaped and hovered above the metallic floor. The middle chair was the largest and three times the size of the others.

The largest faced the opposite wall. It wasn't much of a wall; just a large panel of glass on the side of the spaceship that now had a clear view of Planet

Earth.

The marble Earth and the chipped moon hung in front of the empty darkness and the stars, Earth's oceans bluer than the alien saviour, the wispy clouds

swirling and twirling endlessly...

This was where Indigo came to imagine Earth as it had been. He'd seen images of it; their underground colony on the far off world played a slideshow of

past Earth every day. It was to keep spirits up. Every day when it played people would gather to sit and watch and to be reminded that someday everything

would be fine instead of cramped and dark living underground.

Indigo had always seen this and hoped to go to Earth someday. His generation had never been on the blue planet.

When their race had left Earth it had taken hundreds of years with the technology of the time to reach their destination. Once they awoke from their

suspended animation and took shelter under their harsh new planet it had taken _thousands _to gather energy to return. Now a travel to and from only took 3

months.

Of course, not being able to live for thousands of years was the reason aliens like Indigo, Pai, Kisshu, Taruto etc. had never been on Earth before.

Personally, Indigo would have rather suffered the natural disasters that had caused them to leave than to come back to- to _this! _Humans! Spoiling the

beautiful Earth and acting like it was theirs, like there was no consequence! Well. That would all change. He didn't care if their own planet was now

habitable, Earth _would_be reclaimed.

If generations of their race had only survived from hope all those years, then shouldn't it be right that they get their wish? Sure, people _liked _what had been

done back on New Earth, they _loved _it! But Earth was their true origin.

"Indigo-sama."

He snapped out of his thoughts and looked at the alien teleporting into the room. "Are we ready, Kiko?"

Kiko nodded his head and pulled up his hood. "We are ready"

As they sat down, the other fifteen supporters on the ship also teleported in, covered themselves with the hoods of their cloaks and took a seat.

Indigo sat proudly in his seat. "How are our animas coming along?"

To the right of him a female spoke. "We are developing Chimera Animas to make them stronger against attacks."

"Good and what about the scanning of Earth?"

A male on the left replied. He sighed. "I'm afraid we're having trouble. Our technology isn't helpful."

Indigo paused. "Well, you have to come over that! We need to be one step ahead of the humans and those animas _and _scans will help. We've been put to

shame by them the previous mission and it won't happen again."

The woman spoke again. "That was only due to the failure of the other three, sir."

This led them to another topic. "Ah, yes, I was getting to that." An opaque panel covered the window and started to show images. There was an image of

each mew both when they were transformed and a regular person, this was followed by pictures of Tart, Pai and Kisshu.

"These five humans are going to stand in our way as we already know. This has been demonstrated from today's encounter with the Chimera Anima and on

the previous mission to Earth. Ichigo Momomiya is the leader of this group – the Tokyo Mew Mew. She is followed by Mint Aizawa, Lettuce Midorikawa,

Pudding Fong and Zakuro Fujiwara."

"Um," someone to the left spoke up nervously. "Indigo-sama, is this necessary? They will disrupt our plans, but we can take them."

Indigo spoke calmly. "It is completely necessary, these are no ordinary girls."

The last mew image rolled off the screen and the aliens appeared instead.

Indigo continued. "And it is true that our own people are going against us. These three who went to earth on the previous mission have chosen to help the

Tokyo Mew Mews to

"Maybe…" Kiko interrupted. Everyone turned their head towards him and he stood up and wandered over to the panel. "I think that maybe it's worth trying

to get these three _back _on our side." He paused the pictures on Tart. "Taruto could be persuaded, I believe."

"And why should he do that?" Indigo questioned.

"He's a child, easy to convince. He was very keen to save our people."

Indigo shook his head. "This is ridiculous, Kiko, all three of them know better and stick to what they did."

Kiko resumed the slideshow and took his seat again. "I still think it's worth a try, they have good abilities."

He shook his head again. "You have no hope. Taruto is likely to stay with the other two, Pai knows better and will stick with what he thinks is best and

Kisshu… Kisshu's made his mind to go against us and there's no changing it. He'll be too stubborn. Besides, he's gone soft for humans."

Kiko tried not to laugh. The truth was the two of them had been rivals for a long time, ever since they were children and Kisshu's attitude hadn't helped one

bit.

"As they have gone against us," Indigo continued. "They must either be converted, or much more likely, they must be erased."

"Could we not just take them back, imprison them, torture them and _then _kill them? Just for fun?"

Indigo shot Kiko a look. "You're starting to sound like Kisshu."

He instantly shut up. That got him.

Indigo stood up. "You may leave."

Everyone stood and spoke together. "Thank you, Indigo-san."

With that they teleported out of the room and left Indigo to stare at the beautiful, blue planet.


	11. Treason

"MEW MEW STRAWBERRY!"

"MEW MEW MINT!"

"MEW MEW LETTUCE!"

"MEW MEW PUDDING!"

"MEW MEW ZAKURO!"

"METAMORPHO-SIS!"

Today hadn't started well for Ichigo. First she'd woken up late from trying to call and message Aoyama _all _night then she'd had to rush to the café even

though she was still late! _That _had led to an argument with Shirogane but then an apology from Keiichiro, soon she found herself being irritated by both

Mint and Kish, having to help clean up after Pudding had dropped a cake whilst hopping around on a unicycle. By the time she finally had a break and had

gotten through to Masaya, she'd had to leave due to a Chimera Anima alert down at the docks. So much for a break. Come to think of it, that break would

be over by the time this was all done. _GGRrrr!  
><em>  
>By the sea a giant Chimera Lobster was tossing ship containers around. At least there were no aliens around, not that she could see.<p>

She pointed at the lobster. "Let's get this done quickly! I have to have some time to relax don't I?"

Mint shrugged behind her. "Whatever you say, Ichigo-san."

"Let's go!"

The girls leapt up and took different positions around the lobster. The three aliens hovered above it.

"Ribbon strawberry check!"

"Ribbon Mint echo!"

"Ribbon Lettuce rush!"

"Ribbon Pudding Ring Inferno!"

"Ribbon Zakuro Spear!"

"HO-RAI-DEN!"

"KUU-RAI-SEN-PUU-JIN!"

The anima roared in pain. This was going to be fairly simple; it was too big to be particularly fast-moving. The burning red plates covering its body

combined with its enormous size prevented mush movement. It did, however, have strength on its side.

Ichigo's pendant started flashing.

"Oh, Akasaka-san?"

As usual, Keiichiro spoke through it. _"Mew Ichigo, I've had another alert of a Chimera Anima!"  
><em>  
>"Whaa? Another one? Where is it?"<br>_  
>"Other side of Tokyo, it's going to take some time to get there."<br>_  
>She sighed. "Ah, alright, we'll get there."<p>

Ichigo turned to her friends. "We're going to have to split up."

Pudding grabbed hold of Tart. "I'M GOING WITH TARU-TARUUU!"

"Agh! Get off me!" as usual, Tart protested and struggled and eventually gave up. "Fine. I usually end up stuck with you."

"YAAY!" Pudding squealed as she practically suffocated Taruto in another hug. "TARU-TARU!"

"There's no time to make a big deal out of this!" Pai interrupted. "Lettuce!"

Looking slightly flustered and pink, Lettuce jumped when he mentioned her name. "Yes? Pai-san?"

"You and I will stay here with Pudding and Taruto."

Tart crossed his arms and stuck his nose up. "Why do I always get left with you?"

Pudding punched the air with enthusiasm. "Yes, nanoda!"

Pai turned to the remaining mews. "The rest of you go to the second Chimera Anima."

Ichigo nodded. "Of course!"

Zakuro, Mint, Ichigo and Kisshu obeyed their orders and started to run towards the next location.

"Oh, and Kisshu!"

Kish turned back at Pai's voice. "Yo?"

"Don't get distracted."

Kish smirked but didn't say anything, not to Pai at least. Instead he called for the three running ahead of him. "Hey! That's pointless; _I_ can get us there

faster."

The three turned back and stood around Kisshu and with another smirk in the others direction he teleported them away from the docks.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

They found themselves in an area where there was mountain-like terrain, fresh air and a river flowing by slowly.  
><em><br>'Other side of Tokyo,' _Ichigo thought grimly. _'This wasn't even _in _Tokyo, was it?'  
><em>  
>"Where is the anima?" Mint asked. There was no sound of anything, just leaves rustling in the trees, water trickling, a light breeze went past… No chaos<p>

usually caused by a Chimer anima.

"Is- is there even anything here?" Ichigo asked. She turned to Kisshu and frowned. "Or did your teleport mess up?"

He held up his hands. "Nothing to do with me, my teleportation's perfect."

She muttered under her breath. "We'll see about _that!"  
><em>  
>"I heard that, koneko-chan." Kish told her.<br>_  
>"Aargh!" <em>Ichigo growled in frustration. _"WHY ARE YOU SO NOSY LATELY!"  
><em>  
>"Hush!" Zakuro snapped. Ichigo stopped yelling and looked down at Mew Zakuro. She was knelt down by the ground and staring straight ahead, but not<p>

really looking at anything, more like concentrating.

"Oneesama?" Mint breathed. "But we can't hear anything."

"It's not what you can hear," Zakuro said softly. "It's what you can feel…"

Everyone (exception Kish) got closer to the ground. Soon, very soon, they were sure they stared to feel something.

The ground shook beneath them. Zakuro shot up, Mint shrieked, Ichigo fell flat on her face, Kisshu stumbled. The tremors were so strong they made

rumbling sounds.

"What was that?" he yelled.

Before anyone could answer, the earth burst open behind them and once the soil and the dust had cleared, they saw the giant Chimera Anima. And the

alien with it.

()()  
>(0.0)<p>

"…INFERNO!"

The lobster got caught up in Pudding's Pudding Ring.

Pudding landed on the dock. "What do we do now?"

"Can it break free?" Lettuce asked in a timid voice.

"If we send any more attacks we could destroy the Pudding Ring." Pai said simply. "We should just leave it."

They stood there looking at the huge pudding ring and the anima in it. It all seemed too easy. It was a pretty poor anima.

Soon there was a flash of pink light and both the jelly and lobster were gone.

Lettuce broke the silence. "We should go help the others."

Pai took a moment to think before responding. "Yeah, we should."

The four of them turned to teleport away, but then…

"AH! HELP, NANODA!"

"Pudding-san!" Lettuce cried out as a second Chimera Lobster pulled itself out of the water and used its antenna to drag Pudding into the air.

"Ribbon… LETTUCE RUSH!"

"HO-RAI-DEN!"

"FUU-HYOU-SEN!"

When the three attacks hit it, the lobster squealed as the antenna holding Pudding was broken off. Pudding unwrapped her leg and prepared her weapon.

"Ribbon…Pudding Ring… INFERNO!"

"KUU-RAI-SEN-PUU-JIN!"

Pai used his attack to dissolve the pudding ring and the Chimera Lobster with it.

"What is going _on?" _Tart shouted and pointed to three more lobsters emerging from the sea.

"H-how many are there?" Lettuce shook.

Pudding stared in amazement. "Aaahh, so many animas, nanoda!"

"Everyone, get ready." Pai told them.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>(")(")0

"AH! Seems we're all ready." Kiko floated high above the chimera anima and looked at them all closely. "Oh, how strange. There's only three of you, plus

that pathetic thing over there."

Kisshu gave his enemy a glare and held up his swords. He spoke slowly. _"What… _did you call me?"

Ichigo stood in forwards. "Listen!" she spat. "Because of you and your Chimera Animas we've had to leave our friends behind with another, we've had to

give up all our spare time and we've had to cope with aliens returning and the constant threat of the entire Earth being destroyed! You have your planet,

and we have ours, why should you come back after all this time?"

Kiko seemed to ignore her speech. He frowned. "Another? This is the only Chimera Anima I've released today."

"Don't lie!" Mint butted in. "There's another anima down at the docks! How else could it have gotten there if _you _didn't release it?"

"Oh! At the docks! Right, I get it now. We've had to dump our rejects into your sea. True, it's a threat to the environment, but that's nothing compared to

what you people have done! Earth should be destroyed in no time ready for _us!" _He let out a laugh and raised his sword. "CHIMERA ANIMA! GO!"

The chimera anima couldn't have been an animal; it was too… too messed up. It had a head like a Komodo dragons, a body like a _ferret _and tail like a seal.

Somehow it had burrowed into the Earth, probably thanks to those claws on its feet and was possibly the strangest Chimera Anima they'd ever

encountered.

They all jumped into the air as the dragon/ferret/seal charged forward, sending up chunks of soil and rock as it went.

Mint flew above trying to get the best weak spot. She clutched her bow ready to fire. "Agh! Where do I hit?"

Kisshu flew up behind her and lifted her higher. "Try there, bluebird."

Mint didn't like being told what to do by someone like him, but she did as she was told just this one time. "RIBBON…MINT ECHO!"

The arrow hit the side of the body and damaged one of the legs. She realised it couldn't burrow or charge if it hurts its legs. "EVERYONE!" she called.

Looking down she saw Mew Zakuro on the other side of the anima. "Oneesama! Trap the legs!"

Zakuro nodded and summoned her cross. "RIBBON…ZAKURO SPEAR!"

"RIBBON MINT ECHO!"

Now two legs on either side were damaged, it couldn't move so far now.

Kiko watched from above and saw their plan. "That's definitely an improvement to make on the next one."

"There won't _be _a next one!"

Kisshu teleported next to Kiko and held a sword up to his neck.

Kiko sighed. "Oh please, Kisshu, you couldn't beat me last time! You had to have a girl save you."

"Indigo's certainly got a lot of faith in you to let you go fight so many times."

"Which is more than can be said for you. Traitor."

Kish the anger rise and he sent his second sword aiming at Kiko's stomach.

Before he could be injured Kiko defended himself with his sword. "You keep on trying, but you keep on losing!"

The two of them quickly became locked in a fight, each attempting to spear the other and both managing to block the attacks.

Ichigo tried to shut out the clashing of the metal above her and focused on getting ready to finish off this anima. Mint had broken the first leg; she'd gotten

the second and now the third. Once this last one was done it would be Ichigo's turn to blast the anima.

"…MINT ECHO! Now, Mew Ichigo!"

Ichigo held out her arm to catch the Strawberry Bell. "RIBBON…"

Kiko looked down and saw the attack coming. He knew not to be distracted, but he couldn't help it.

"…Strawberry… SURPRISE!"

In a second the anima burst into pink light and vanished. The jellyfish parasite and the glowing pink orb was all that was left. Wait, pink orb?

Kisshu gave up on his battle and went back down to join the others.

Ichigo held the pink orb. "This… this is a spirit…" she looked at the alien horrified. "YOU'VE GONE BACK TO USING HUMAN SPIRITS!"

Zakuro spoke to her. "Ichigo, calm down. Masha can get it back."

Masha appeared beside her. _"Masha will return! Masha will return the spirit!"  
><em>  
>Ichigo gave Masha the spirit, but was still mad.<p>

"Well," Kiko folded his arms. "Looks like I'm done. Oh, wait! There's still something I need to do."

The alien snapped his fingers and just as he was about to speak, Kisshu disappeared.

"Kisshu! What have you done?" Ichigo yelled.

Kiko smiled at her and then disappeared himself.

()()  
>(0.0)<p>

"How many more are there?"

Pudding, Lettuce, Pai and Taruto had been through eight chimera lobsters so far. Every time one disappeared more would come and they were getting

exhausted.

"It's been a while since the last one," Pudding pointed out. "What do you think, Taru-taru?"

Tart opened his mouth… and then vanished.

"TARU-TARU!"

Lettuce looked to her left where Pai had been standing. "PAI-SAN!"

"Where have they gone, nanoda?"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>(") (")0

The 3 aliens found themselves in a large, dark room surrounded by fifteen cloaked and hooded figures. Kiko teleported in as well and pulled up his hood to

join the others.

Pai looked around them at each figure and tried to ignore the other two arguing on the floor.

"You didn't have to land on me, runt!"

Kisshu was led on the stone floor with Tart on top of him. He pushed the child off.

"I had a bad landing, that's all! I couldn't help it!" Tart replied.

"Seems that way," Kish stood up and brushed down his shirt.

"Quiet!" Pai told them. "Taruto! Kisshu! No more arguments."

The two of them huffed.

"Perhaps your immaturity caused the failure of your mission."

They all looked up to see Indigo teleport into the room and stand opposite them.

"After all we've done how could you call our mission a failure?" Pai questioned.

Indigo focused on him. "I don't need to answer to you."

"Oh, quit all this," Tart stepped forward. "Why have you brought us here?"

"Silence, child!" their old leader demanded. "You have been brought here so we can offer you the chance to work with us on our mission."

Kish let out a laugh and crossed his arms over for his swords. "HA! Do you seriously think we'd even consider it?"

"Possibly." Indigo continued. "If we told you that your life would be spared."

"We've made our choice!" Tart said loudly. "You weren't there on Earth when we were! You don't understand why we've got to keep fighting for the

humans!"

Pai looked down at Tart. "Taruto…" He leant down and whispered in his ear. "Don't say that around here."

Tart went red. _"I'll say what I like!"  
><em>  
>"So you three would prefer a death sentence?" Indigo carried on.<p>

Kish clutched his swords tight and glared at Indigo. "You can't imprison us _or _kill us for saving a race."

"But I can for treason."

"Treason? Is that was this is?"

"It's close to it."

Kisshu held up his zai. "How _dare _you! _How dare you accuse me of treason! I care about my planet!"  
><em>  
>The two behind him tried to drag him back, but Kish was too frustrated right now to listen to reason and he shook them off. "No! I wanna give him over<p>

there a piece of my mind!"

Pai gripped his arms. "No, Kisshu! Don't be such a fool!"

Kish started struggling. He eventually got one of his arms free and threw one of the zai swords straight in Indigo's direction. It narrowly missed and

disappeared when it hit the floor.

Indigo stared at the spot where it had landed and then at Kisshu. "I think you've make a mistake."

In a spilt second he lifted up his right hand and out of it shot a streak of yellow lightning that hit the floor in Kisshu's direction. "I won't miss next time."

"Oh really?"

Kish decided to go further and threw his other sword. This time it made a slash in Indigo's cheek.

He touched the blood on his face and held up his arm again.

The lightning flashed across the room, hit Kisshu in the chest and sent him flying backwards.

Pai and Tart went over to him. "Kisshu!"

Indigo spoke again. "This was a waste of time. Next time you disrespect me like that, you _will _die."

Just as Taruto was going to yell at him, the three aliens were teleported away from the spacecraft and landed outside the Café Mew Mew.


	12. Mew Aqua

Ichigo was in no mood to go back to the café. It was Sunday and because of what had happened with Masaya she'd had to cancel another date. She

grumbled she stepped into the café. They had to be here on their day off! Why?

She made her way down to the basement and found the other mews plus Ryou and Keiichiro already there.

"You're late." Ryou commented.

"I shouldn't even _be _here, so don't give me that!" Ichigo snapped back. "Why _am _I here? Why are we all here?"

"Akasaka-san detected Mew Aqua." Lettuce explained.

"Mew Aqua?"

He nodded. "Yes. I've found three sources around Tokyo and they're gaining energy, fast!"

The computer screen showed a map with three blinking dots of blue. They were in a triangle near the edges of Tokyo so it would take a while to get to each.

"So are we just collecting it or helping it lose energy?" Zakuro asked.

"I'm not sure," Keiichiro said. "But I want you to split up into three groups to see what's going on."

The five mews nodded. "Okay."

Instantly they made their way to the mew aquas. Ichigo paused at the staircase out of the basement. "Wait! Where's the others? Aren't they coming?"

Ryou sat down. "It's too risky for any of them to go out. Pai has said they were given a death threat. Taruto does what he's told, so he won't be going and I

think Kisshu needs rest for now."

"Right, right, I get it." Ichigo sighed and followed the others.

"Mint!"

"Yes, oneesama?"

"You go with Mew Ichigo, Pudding and Lettuce you go to the next Mew Aqua."

Mint looked at Zakuro with a concerned face. "Oneesama! You can't do it on your own!"

"I'll be fine, just go and find that Mew Aqua!"

"MEW MEW STRAWBERRY!"

"MEW MEW MINT!"

"MEW MEW LETTUCE!"

"MEW MEW PUDDING!"

"MEW MEW ZAKURO!"

"METAMORPHO-SIS!"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>(")(")0

Ichigo and Mint reached the place where the mew aqua's signal was coming from.

"Isn't this where the Chimera Anima was yesterday?" Mint asked.

Ichigo looked round. "Yes…"

She hadn't noticed it before, but this _was _where they'd fought yesterday. It had the same hills, river, the same trees… and even a giant hole in the ground

where the Anima had burrowed.

Mint examined the hole closely. "You don't think that chimera anima was to find Mew Aqua, do you?"

"Could be, but if it is then we mustn't let our guard down!" Ichigo brushed her hair out of her eyes. "Now where's this Mew Aqua?"

"More importantly, where are the aliens?" Mint added.  
><em><br>"Aah!"  
><em>  
>They heard Lettuce's voice through their Mew pendants.<p>

Ichigo took hers off and held it up to her lips. "Mew Lettuce? Mew Lettuce!"  
><em><br>"There's aliens here! We have to disarm the Mew Aqua!"  
><em>  
>Mint huffed. "Disarm? Lettuce what are you talking about?"<p>

"There's two aliens here! They want the Mew Aqua's power, we have to destroy it!"

Ichigo started to get worried. "What do they want? Mew Lettuce? Hello?"

She put her pendant back onto her collar and sighed. "We have to _find _that mew aqua!"

The two of them got to work. Mint flew down into the Chimera Anima's burrow in the hopes that it may have found something down there. Ichigo headed

for the river and tried to see through the water. Yesterday's burrowing anima had created a lot of fine dust and that dust had now settled on the surface of

the water.

Could this be classed as pollution? Ichigo wondered. No, it would just sink to the bottom. Maybe Aoyama would know. _Aoyama…  
><em>  
>Ichigo knew this wasn't the time to think about this stuff, but she couldn't help it.<p>

Was it right for her to become a Mew again? Would Masaya understand? She hoped so. She hoped he would just let her do what she needed to do. Why did

this have to happen to her? _Why does this happen to me? This should've ended three months ago! This should've ended with Deep Blue!  
><em>  
>Deep Blue.<em><br>_  
>Just that thought sent a tear escaping from her eyelid. The tear fell and splashed into the river.<p>

"Mew Ichigo!"

She was aware of Mint beside her. "What?"

"The Mew Aqua!"

"Huh?"

She opened her eyes to find her whole body glowing a pale blue. In front of her the water of the river also was glowing.

Out of the rainbow water rose an orb that floated in the air and sent out a bright light. Mew Aqua.

Ichigo smiled, wiped her eyes and reached out to grab the mew aqua when a strange voice spoke behind her.

"Thank you." It said. "Thank you for activating the Mew Aqua for us."

The girls looked back to see two aliens floating above them. Ichigo recognised the first, that was Kiko, but the second… that one she hadn't seen before, but

she did notice that he looked a lot like Deep Blue. He was tall, had a cloak like Kiko's and he had long, sandy hair.

"What do you think you're doing?" Mint shouted in her usual snobbish way. "What do you mean 'activating'?"

Kiko spoke. "This is a test of the Mew Aqua's power." He told them, flying over their heads and pausing at the aqua orb. "Your teammates have done the

same thing with the other Mew Aqua's. It's only a matter of time now."

Ichigo looked at the floating mew aqua warily, worrying about its powers to heal and to destroy.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>o(")(")

"AH! Pudding-san!"

"I can't use my Pudding Ring, nanoda!" Pudding sighed and abandoned her rings.

They were in an open shopping centre somewhere in the city. The mew aqua had broken through and up out of the ground, leaving a crack running through

the concrete. Defending the mew aqua were two aliens. One was a woman with long, black hair that reached her _knees _and was bony with sharp facial

features. She had her cloak open and underneath was a dress made of shimmery, dark blue fabric. The second was a man and he was tall, had short purple

-grey hair and a deep voice.

Lettuce had been reminded of Pai when she saw the alien. That's what had triggered the Mew Aqua to make an appearance.

When she saw him, she thought of how the two species from the same species had to fight like this and that even though they had their own planet they

still came back. Emotion had activated the aqua and before she knew it her body was glowing and the aqua orb was spitting out shocks of energy. It was

becoming unstable.

Now Lettuce glared at the aliens furiously. "You would do this even though you have your own planet? Well I won't let you! Lettuce Castanets!"

"Ribbon… LETTUCE RUSH!"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0 ()()

"RIBBON… ZAKURO SPEAR!"

One of the three aliens backed away. "Woah, you sure know how to use that thing!"

Zakuro growled and gripped her cross firmly. "What do you intend to do with the Mew Aqua?" she barked.

Another alien, smaller and with a higher voice, came forward. "As if we're gonna tell you! I tell you, it's a wonder the others who came to earth couldn't

manage you!"

"It's a wonder you're so selfish!" Zakuro shouted back. "Trying to defeat our planet when you have your own Earth just as beautiful already, all for your

saviour."

The small one looked at her uneasily. "We follow Deep Blue-sama's wishes."

Zakuro looked down and spoke calmly. "Pathetic. Can you not see? Can you not _tell _that Deep Blue never wanted to save you? All he wanted was to become

ruler of this planet."

"That's not true!" the small alien argued. He was like Taruto, but a little older. He certainly had a personality similar to Tart's.

The other two pulled him back. "That's enough. She's not worth our time."

One of them looked down at her. "We have no need for you now you've activated our Mew Aqua. I never knew you could be so emotional. From what I've

heard you're the strongest mew."

The Strongest Mew looked back down sadly and tried to force the tear out of her eye. Emotion was a weakness, but she'd fallen into their trap. Her body

started to glow again. _Oh god… _Zakuro had no control over the thoughts now going through her head. They were about her mysterious childhood, her life in

America… her family… She gripped her cross again and looked back up at the aliens.

"You may have activated the mew aqua, but I'll _never let you do anything more with it!"  
><em>  
>Zakuro leapt up into the air and the purple spear of light came out the end of the cross. She pulled it up and the light hit one of the aliens. Whatever<p>

happened, she had to stop them.

(\(\  
>(0.0)<br>0(")")

"LET ME AT IT!"

Ichigo was pushed back onto the floor. It was worth a try attempting to push past Kiko to get to the aqua, but it had failed.

They were getting desperate. They had no idea what the aliens were planning, but it was big.

Ichigo looked at the orb. It was glowing brightly and had sparks jumping around it. Were- were they going to explode it? _No… Wait… _Her memory went back

to the morning when she had seen the dots on the computer screen. The Mew Aquas had been in a triangle shape… How had she not noticed this before!

Mentally, Ichigo slapped herself in the face. They were going to wipe out Tokyo!

The mew aquas had been _positioned _in a triangle especially so they could explode Tokyo and the areas around it! And what had Kiko said? _'This is a test of_

the Mew Aqua's power'…

She looked over to see Mint firing arrows at Kiko, who skilfully bounced them back with his thick sword.

"Mint!"

Mint groaned and fired another arrow. "What is it Ichigo? I'm kinda busy!"

Ichigo got up on her feet. "We _have _to destroy the Mew Aqua!"

Her friend landed beside her after dodging a lightning bolt from Indigo and gave her an are-you-crazy? look. _"What?"  
><em>  
>"They're going to use its power to blow up the city!"<p>

Mint looked at the aqua, then the aliens, then back at Ichigo. "H-how..?"

"Leave it to me!Ichigo removed her pendant from her choker. She spoke through it. "Lettuce? Pudding? Zakuro?"  
><em><br>"Yes?" "Hi, nanoda!" "Mew Ichigo?"  
><em>  
>"I need you to get to that aqua as fast as you can!"<br>_  
>"O-of course!" "But it's hard, nanoda!" "I'm on it, what do you need us to do?"<br>_  
>"We need to destroy that mew aqua or Tokyo goes with it!"<br>_  
>"I'm almost there!" "Pudding's gunna try extra-hard, nanoda!" "Understood."<br>_  
>Ichigo put back her pendant. Indigo was looking at the aqua. "It's almost ready. Kiko, I'll leave this to you."<p>

"Of course, Indigo-sama."

Indigo teleported away and Kiko looked back at them. "You'll have to try hard if you want this aqua."

"That we will!" Ichigo yelled. "MINT! NOW!"

Mint flew up into the air and continued firing arrows at Kiko. It was to distract him so Ichigo could get behind.

She waited till Mint had him facing the other direction, she didn't want to be caught (that sword looked painful), then she leapt up into the air, flipped and

founded herself on the other side of the river.

"MEW POWER EXTENSION!"

Mint dropped to the floor and did the same. "-EXTENSION!"

Pink and Blue shot up into the sky. Moments later, they noticed green, yellow and purple beams in the distance. Kiko put away his sword and teleported.

"Damn it!"

The aquas started fizzling and reaching critical point. They spat and shook and flashed and then… then they exploded. Drops of neon blue were sent out and

the beams of coloured light faded.

The force of the explosion inside the extension sent Ichigo flying. She managed to stop herself from falling too far and put away her Strawberry Bell.

"Did we make it?"

Mint stood up and brushed herself down. "We made it."

A small, glass-like sphere of glowing blue rolled to Ichigo's feet. She picked it up. "I suppose we'd better start collecting the Mew aqua?"


	13. The plan is revealed!

"That's all of them."

Ichigo put the last orb of mew aqua into the steel case. Ryou quickly locked it. "We'll have to keep in here until we know how to store it properly.

"You need to keep these safe," Pai mentioned. "If the supporters know we have the Mew Aqua they'll stop at nothing to take it."

Keiichiro nodded and took the case. "I'll put this in the safe; nothing except me can get it there."

"What will they use it for?" Zakuro asked. "We can only learn so much from their test."

"They were going to destroy Tokyo as a test." Mint said. "The aliens turned it into an explosive."

Pai was thinking hard. "They're after the mew aqua, they must need it."

In the background Kisshu started clapping his hands sarcastically. "Oh, well done genius."

"Kisshu, will you keep your mouth _shut?" _Pai told him.

Ichigo looked at him. He was leant in a chair as usual with his feet resting on the table. "You _must _be feeling better to comment so much all the time."

Kish protested. "Have I commented yet today? No, so could we please all stop having a go at me? Thank you."

"Is everybody here stupid?" Tart spoke up.

"Taruto!" Pai snapped.

Tart floated above a table. "Deep Blue's supporters are gathering mew aqua and blowing it up as a test right? So that means they're probably gunna use it

to wipe out the Earth! With enough Aqua they'd be able to do it easily!"

Pudding squealed. _"AH! TARU-TARU'S SO SMART, NANODA!"_

Ryou thought for a moment. "You might be right…" he looked up at the mew mews. "If that is the case then you five will need to find the remaining Mew

Aquas in the city and fast. We need to get them and contain them before Deep Blue's people do."

Ichigo frowned. "This is just like the last time we had to fight! All day and all night searching for aqua, I'll have no spare time! AGAIN!"

"Look do you want to lose to the aliens?" Ryou said. "I don't care, just _find _that mew aqua!"

"We'll need to continue repairing our ship," Pai said. "We may be able to search for the most likely areas that contain Mew Aqua. All I need to do is get the

scanners working."

"Ok," Ryou nodded. "Everyone, first thing tomorrow we need to be _here _at the café. We'll need to go out before the aliens reach the aqua."

Everyone agreed. Pai, Kisshu and Tart all teleported to their crashed ship to repair the controls and Ichigo went home. She needed rest for the search

tomorrow.

/)/)  
>(0.0)<br>O(')(')

"What was the result of the Mew Aqua explosion?"

Kiko took down his hood and gave his master Indigo an uneasy look. "Well, Indigo-sama, it seems, uh, the Mew Mews destroyed the Mew Aqua before it

could wipe them out, so, uh…"

Indigo gave Kiko a look. "You're saying we failed."

"Yes, Indigo-sama. My apologies, Indigo-sama."

"Tokyo is still intact?"

"Unfortunately yes, master. We will continue the hunt for more Mew Aqua. Shall I send out Chimera Animas as a distraction for the Mew Mews?"

Indigo thought for a moment. "No. We shan't do anything."

"B-but, Indigo-sama, they'll get all the Aqua before us!"

"No, they won't. Let them search for mew aqua. Take a look at this energy reading."

Behind Kiko a large opaque panel appeared. It showed a map of Tokyo and one huge Mew Aqua source.

Kiko grinned. "Oh, I see. Genius."


	14. Aqua hunt

The streets of Tokyo were unusually crowded today, which was bad news for the Mews.

"Ugh! How are we going to get there fast enough?" Mint grumbled, pushing her way past the crowds.

"What if an alien shows up in public?" Lettuce worried. "I can't transform here!"

Ichigo managed to stay on her feet after stumbling over something in the path. "Where's Kisshu when you need him?"

Mint tried not to laugh. "Oh?"

Ichigo looked back and frowned at her. "He has a teleport, remember?"

"So do the other two."

She didn't reply anymore, partly because of Mint's commenting, but partly because she was too busy trying to navigate her way through the people in their path.

"I can't see where I'm going!" Pudding complained.

Lettuce stopped to grab her hand. "This way, Pudding-san!"

After running through the busy street they were all pretty tired, but they still weren't where they needed to be.

They all paused. Ichigo took out her pendant and spoke through it. "Akasaka-san, where are we going now?"  
><em><br>"Straight ahead. You'll know when you see it; it's a park with a huge lake. The lake is probably why the Mew Aqua signal comes from there."  
><em>  
>"We're on our way." Ichigo told him before putting away her pendant and running the rest of the way to the park, apologising to many people as they pushed past.<p>

Eventually they found themselves in the park. It wasn't as busy as anywhere else, but there were quite a few people around and there was no way they could transform.

Ichigo rushed over to the edge of the lake and leant over the railings that went around it. "Where's the mew aqua?"

"It must be underwater." Zakuro joined her and stared into the sparkling, blue water.

(\(\  
>(0.0)<br>o(')(')

One of the many screens on the control panel bleeped and lines of text whizzed down on it.

Tart leant over and looked down at the information. "Pai!"

The other alien next to him abandoned the wires that had been pulled out of a circuit and looked over. "What is it, Taruto?"

"What's it doing?"

Pai paused for a moment to read. "It's Keiichiro Akasaka; he's telling us they've found more Mew Aqua!"

He got up and put a cover over the tangled wiring.

Tart stood up. "What are you doing?"

"Going to get Kisshu." Pai replied simply.

"Oh. He's in his room."

Pai sighed. "What's he doing in there? He's _supposed _to be helping us!"

Tart didn't bother to say anything back. Those two hadn't been getting along too well and Tart had decided not to get involved.

Leaving Tart in the control room of their ship he made his way down the winding corridors to where Kish was.

He banged on the sliding door. "Kisshu!" There was no response. "KISSHU!"

On the other side the green-haired alien was led on a hammock. He lifted his hands from his pointed ears at the banging. "What is it?"

He heard Pai's voice from the other side of the door. "There's a Mew Aqua, we've received a message to go and help."

"They can handle it themselves."

There was a huge bang on the door. _"WHY ARE YOU BEING SO STUBBORN?"  
><em>  
>Kisshu sat up slightly. Pai never usually showed anger <em>this <em>strong. Sometimes he got angry, but never like that.

Then there was a sigh. "Kisshu… I know how it is with the others, with Deep Blue's supporters…" he seemed hesitant to speak. "…with Ichigo. But we need to help the humans for their

planet. It used to be ours, so it's only right we help to protect it."

Kish felt a sadness come over him. "Ichigo…"

"So come with us. It'll be all over soon and then we can leave."

There was an awkward silence and after a while it seemed that Pai had left. Kisshu was left in his box room.

Spaceship rooms were never that comfortable, there was a small square room that contained one off-ground hammock, a small seat that hung down from the ceiling, a tiny wardrobe and a

thin window that stretched across the back wall. It was right up next to the ceiling so you couldn't see much even from the hammock, just the dark space and stars twinkling. Though,

despite everything, Kish liked his room and was in his best mood when he was left alone there to think and dream of Earth. On the way back from Earth the first time, Kish remembered

seeing the blue planet and thinking of everything he'd been through. He'd been relieved he'd survived, excited to be able to save their home planet and the people on it that he cared about

so much and also, he'd felt overjoyed knowing Ichigo was still alive and safe… somewhere… Right now he felt not much at all. All the worry and frustration had gone once he'd been able to

escape to his room.

He groaned and rolled out of his hammock. Once they'd found the mew aqua he could go to relax again some other time.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(')(')

"There's no aliens here…" Lettuce murmured.

Mint looked back over her shoulder. "It could be a trick; they could be waiting for something."

"Mint's right. Don't let your guard down." Zakuro nodded.

Ichigo rested her hands on the railings and gazed into the water. Where was that aqua?

"So, what are we looking at, koneko-chan?"

She gritted her teeth as Kisshu teleported behind her. He stood close and put his hands next to hers on the railings.

"Kisshu," Ichigo said slowly. _Trust him to ruin a peaceful moment!_

"Yes, koneko-chan?"

"Are you not supposed to be fixing your ship?"

He smirked. "Pai's been doing that, he's the technical stuff."

She tried to resist the urge to kick him. _Need an excuse to get rid of him!  
><em>  
>"Well then aren't you supposed to be scanning for mew aqua?"<p>

"Even our technology can't do any better at finding it than yours." He explained. "Besides we haven't even finished repairing the scanners yet."

Ichigo growled at him and pushed back his arm to get free. "We can't just waste time; we have to find that mew aqua!"

Kish looked at her. "How right you are, kitty cat. But where are we going to start?"

She looked past him at the lake. Oh, this was going to be a problem. The lake was huge and they couldn't just dive in randomly.

"Look at those, nanoda!"

Mint heard Pudding's excitable voice and sighed. "Pudding, we can't just mess about, we have to-"

"Wait." Zakuro looked in the direction Pudding was pointing at. She saw several row-boats drifting along on the water. "We can use those. Good work Pudding."

Zakuro went over to the edge of the lake. Here the railings had been cut off and a row of boats rested on the sandy ground. Ichigo and the others followed.

Lettuce frowned when she saw the boats. "Do we really have to use these?"

"There's no other way to find the Mew Aqua."

Lettuce reluctantly stepped into one of the boats. She looked uncomfortable sat there, probably because she couldn't swim and was terrified of deep water because of it, but seemed to relax

a bit as soon as Pai sat down as well.

They pushed the boats into the water and hopped in. They chose two rowing boats and separated to search the lake easier. Ichigo was relieved to have escaped Kisshu this time. She

breathed a quiet sigh of relief as she saw the boat with him in it drift away.

"This is so much fun, nanoda!"

Ichigo looked round to see Pudding cheerfully rowing their boat and Taruto not-so-cheerfully helping. They had an oar each and moving the boat forwards.

Tart groaned. "Why is it I always get stuck with you?"

"Because Taru-taru and Pudding are friends!"  
><em><br>"Argh!"  
><em>  
>Ichigo giggled at the pair, it wasn't so bad being grouped with them. Personally she thought they were kind of cute. They may have had the smallest group, but they would try their best.<p>

She glanced over at the other boat which was further away and saw the five others scanning the lake for any signs of aqua. Pai had gotten into their boat when he saw Lettuce there by

herself; Mint had automatically gone with her oneesama and Kisshu had been dragged in to do the rowing, which he wasn't looking to happy about.

Ichigo giggled again. She decided it was best not to get distracted, so stood at the front of the little boat and looked hard into the water.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>("(")0

"Keiichiro, any luck?"

Ryou poked his head round the doorway in the basement. Keiichiro was sat at the computer as usual and was searching for any more energy signals that would represent Mew Aqua.

"No," he replied and pointed to the blue dot on the lake. "It's still only that one."

"Ok, keep checking." Ryou sighed and went back upstairs. There were no customers; the shop had been closed for the day, so he could just sit at a tablewithout being disturbed. All this

searching for mew aqua was getting annoying. There were always aliens in the way to try and battle them and there was the constant threat of being taken over by the Deep Blue people. _All_

_the more reason to find this aqua! _he thought to himself.

Ryou looked at the clock on the wall. 3pm. They had been gone about an hour. Either there were aliens there to distract them or this aqua was particularly hard to find.

He slid further down in his chair. He'd always thought it was impossible for a group of five girls who were basically five _children _(and Zakuro) to save the world. But then again, he hadn't

chosen them.

Just as he was getting into his thoughts there was a huge bang and the cracking, splintering sound of wood which was followed by a rush of air.

Ryou leapt out of his seat and turned. He saw that the door had been broken off and was now lying in a pile of dust on the floor. In the open space stood two aliens, the same two that had

fought Lettuce and Pudding when they'd tried to explode the mew aqua.

The woman stepped forward. "Where d'you think they've hidden the Mew Aqua?"

She didn't seem to spot Ryou, so he took that chance to transform into his cat-self. _What do they want with the Mew Aqua?  
><em>  
>"RYOU! WHAT'S GOING ON?"<p>

Keiichiro must have heard the noise from downstairs. He stood in the café and realised he shouldn't have rushed up like that.

The man teleported in front of him and growled. _"Where's the Mew Aqua?"  
><em>  
>Keiichiro glared at him. "I'm not telling you! Besides, I thought you should be at the lake with the other Mew Aqua signal."<p>

The woman began cackling in the background. "Such fools, humans! We don't need him, get him out."

Ryou watched from under a table, ready to attack if they tried anything funny.

"Well?" she pointed at Keiichiro. "What are you waiting for?"

Ryou wasn't exactly sure what was going on, but he knew that it was the wrong move for Keiichiro to suddenly dash off into the basement. Behind him the male alien followed.

Not wanting anything to happen to Keiichiro, Ryou leapt out from under the table. He hissed at the woman and yowled as he landed on her and clawed at her face.

She growled at the cat and wiped the blood and scratch marks on her cheek. Ryou jumped off ready to pounce again, but this time she was ready. She grabbed a tray and hit him hard as he

sped through the air. He hit the wall and fell to the ground unconscious.

This caused him to change back into a human and the alien threw the tray onto the ground. "Pathetic humans."

/)/)  
>(0.0)<br>O(")(")

"How long have we been out here?"

"Does it matter?"

Kisshu groaned as he pulled the oars. "Yes! It does! How long do I have to keep going?"

Pai was getting impatient. "Until we find the Mew Aqua!"

Kish kept rowing. He seemed to be the only one doing any work. "Y'know I seem to be the only one doing any work."

Mint turned and shushed him. "Quiet! Don't put me off!"

"Alright, keep your hair on birdbrain."

She frowned at him before turning back to the water, he responded with a smirk. This was ridiculous! There he was doing all the hard work and rowing the boat when all _they_ had to do was

lean over the sides and see if they could see any mew aqua. _Good luck with the depth of this water…  
><em>  
>He was half-tempted to give the porpoise a push, but thought it best not to. When he imagined the kind of rant Pai would give him Kish decided to resist shoving her forward.<p>

Kisshu silently laughed to himself. _Aaww, he won't admit it, but Pai _does _like that green one…  
><em>  
>"Kisshu!" Pai said loudly to get his attention.<p>

Kish huffed. "What is it?"

Zakuro looked back and spoke to him. "Can you get us over there?"

He rolled his eyes and forced himself to push the oars harder.

Soon enough they made it to a spot on the far side of the lake where Ichigo's boat was paused and she leant over the front.

"What's up, kitty cat?"

Ichigo glared at him. "Will you be quiet? And will you stop calling me that?"

He smirked and folded his arms. "Yes and no."

The others edged over to get closer to Ichigo and her boat.

"What's up? Did you find anything?" Zakuro asked.

Ichigo paused for a moment and looked back down into the water. "No… Sorry, everyone."

Zakuro looked at her watch. "It's nearly five o clock, we should get back, I don't think we're going to find anything."

"Could the response have been a fake, nanoda?" Pudding asked.

"Possibly," Pai answered. "For now though we'd better get back. Maybe we can search again tomorrow."

()()  
>(O.O)<br>0(")(")

The crowds that had been there previously vanished in the evening, so they all managed to make it back to the café soon after they stopped searching, but they weren't expecting what they

saw when they got back.

Ichigo saw the double-doors had been flown off and she rushed inside. "SHIROGANE! AKASAKA-SAN?"

"Shirogane-san!" Lettuce saw him led on the floor of the café and they all rushed over. "Shirogane-san?"

He started to come round. "Lettuce?"

"Ryou, what happened?" Zakuro spoke to him.

Ryou sat up. "Keiichiro… Where's Keiichiro?"

"Try downstairs!" Zakuro told them.

They helped Ryou onto his feet and rushed downstairs to the basement. They found papers strewn everywhere, the computer chair tipped over, a giant hole in the wall where the safe had

been and Keiichiro just starting to wake up on the floor.

"Akasaka-san, what happened?" Ichigo asked.

He shook his head. "I don't know, those aliens…"

"Aliens? Who were they? What did they look like?"

Pai interrupted. "I think we all should be more worried about this."

He was stood beside the hole where the safe had been. There was a giant chunk taken out of the wall and the metal that had lined the safe and door to it was crumpled on the floor.

Ryou went to inspect it. "The case with the Mew Aqua inside, it's gone!"

Taruto hovered over the chair. "That Mew Aqua signal, could it have been to distract us? We didn't find anything there."

Ryou kicked the metal on the floor. _"DAMN IT! THAT'S WHAT THEY WANTED!"  
><em>  
>"W-what would they plan to do with it?" Lettuce spoke up.<p>

Pudding thought hard. "If the other Mew Aquas were used in that test, then maybe this is the real thing nanoda!"

"Pudding-san?" Lettuce said. "You're saying they may use it as an explosive again?"

"Precisely, nanoda!"

"The mew aqua contains such power," Pai said. "The contents of that case would easily be suitable to destroy a large area of Earth."

Ichigo looked up at him. "How large?"

"Roughly the whole of Japan, if they have more… then possibly most land masses nearby."

Everyone was silent, taking in this information. Pai spoke again. "We have to get it back, fast."


	15. Invasion!

**Note: Sorry for the late update. I should be ashamed of myself! :D Anyway, I wasn't entirely happy with this chapter, or how it ended, so please review to tell me what _you _think about it (cuz I could really do with some feedback).  
>ANYWAY again, enjoy!<strong>

Ichigo ran through the town. "Aoyama-kun! _Aoyama-kun!"  
><em>  
>She stood in the middle of the centre by the fountain. <em>I haven't missed him have I? He hasn't decided not to show up has he?<br>_  
>Ichigo sighed and sat on the side, running her fingers through the cool water. She had the morning to be with Aoyama and had spent most of yesterday trying to persuade him to turn up.<p>

Was he still mad at her for being a Mew? She felt mean, they had to find the Mew Aqua to protect the Earth and here she was making plans with Masaya.

"Momomiya-san!"

She lightened up when she heard his voice. "Aoyama-kun!"

Masaya walked up to her and smiled brightly. "I'm glad I showed up!"

"R-really?"

"Yes, of course. What you have to do, Ichigo, it's for the good of the earth and I should have understood."

"I thought you didn't like me fighting without you?"

He sighed. "I can't anymore, can I? Deep Blue is gone, so the Blue Knight is as well. I was lucky."

There was a silence. Ichigo felt slightly sad knowing he couldn't turn into the Blue Knight anymore.

Masaya smiled again. "Well, let's not think about all that, we've got the day together."

"Ok!" Ichigo hopped up and they walked through the centre arm in arm. Nothing could ruin a moment like this! Or could it…

The sound of an alien's teleport came from behind her and two arms grabbed her waist.

"Let's go, koneko-chan."

Ichigo pushed him back. "KISSHU!"

Masaya grabbed her arm and pulled her backwards towards him. Who could blame him though with all the things Kish had done to him? "_What_did he call you?"

Kisshu floated just above the ground. "Koneko-chan. Got a problem with that, Romeo?"

"Kisshu!" Ichigo yelled. "What are you doing here?"

He smirked. "I've come to collect my little kitty-cat. Goldilocks thought you were probably ditching work, so of course _I _volunteered to come and get you."

"I bet you did…" she muttered. Then she spoke up. "Goldilocks?"

"He owns the place."

"You mean Shirogane?"

"Yeah, him."

Ichigo huffed. "What does _he_want?"

Kish came closer. "We've got some worrying news."

She started to listen more. "O-Oh? How worrying?"

Before he could explain any more, the whole ground shook violently and there was a loud rumbling sound. Masaya grabbed Ichigo's hand. "MOMOMIYA-SAN!"  
><em><br>"AOYAMA-KUN!"  
><em>  
>They were all shook onto their knees and all around them objects in stores fell off the shelves, tables in restaurants toppled over…<br>_  
>"Damn it!" <em>She heard Kisshu's voice. "Hang on, kitty."

"Kisshu?"

Suddenly she found herself surrounded by darkness, a sensation of wind rushing past her and then… the café. She was inside Café Mew Mew. But, how?

The teleport surrounding them vanished and they stood up. By now the tremors had stopped and although everything was a mess it was surprisingly calm.

In the main room of the Café everyone else was stood by the entrance to the basement, talking in panicked voices.

"Ichigo-san!" Ryou came over first.

She frowned at him. "What happened?"

"This is bad, Ichigo. Several alien spaceships just entered our atmosphere." Ryou looked genuinely worried.

Keiichiro took over. "They've positioned themselves over every continent and land mass. Each ship has a Mew Aqua response from inside it; I fear they'll go along with their plan. With the

amount of aqua they have they could use it to cover the globe and destroy us in a single explosion."

Ichigo was silent for a moment, taking it in. "W-what are we going to do?"

"We'll have to FIGHT the evil aliens, nanoda!" Pudding announced enthusiastically.

Tart stuck his nose up in the air. "Hey, I take offense to that!" he protested, but nobody seemed to be listening.

"They probably plan to connect up the Mew Aquas to provide a big enough explosion, so they'll be adding energy to them." Pai explained. "The biggest response is in the biggest ship above

Japan, so the controls to activate the explosion will be in that ship. We need a way inside to stop that order and destroy the machine, neutralising the Mew Aqua."

"Ichigo-san…"

Ichigo looked at Masaya and sighed. "I'm sorry. It's dangerous, but I have to go into the ship."

He grabbed hold of her arm tight. "Ichigo! You can't go up there!"

She turned red with fury and yelled at him. _"Well WHAT a change from earlier!"_

For a moment it looked as though Aoyama was going to say something back. He stared at her with a stunned expression and let go of her. She was suddenly filled with regret for yelling at

him like that. Mint interrupted. "We don't have time for arguments! Let's go already!"

"MEW MEW MINT!"

"MEW MEW LETTUCE!"

"MEW MEW PUDDING!"

"MEW MEW ZAKURO!"

"METAMORPHO-SIS!"

The four mews took their pendants and transformed into their Mew Mew selves.

Ichigo looked back at Aoyama sadly. "I'm sorry... Masaya."

"MEW MEW STRAWBERRY! METAMORPHO-SIS!"

()()  
>(0.0)<br>(")("))0

The five Mews and three aliens raced through the deserted streets of Tokyo. By now the giant alien spaceship was visible. Well, that was an understatement; how could you miss an

enormous, circular spacecraft hovering just high enough to miss the tallest buildings. It had made the sky seem awfully cloudy and grey and it cast a dark shadow over the ground.

You couldn't see the ship's features too well from their point on the ground, it was too dark underneath and it was too high to see above it, so they basically had to _guess _where to enter.

Now they seemed to be directly under it. There was nobody out, it seemed everyone was too terrified and had fled to their homes. Ichigo's parents were probably wondering where she was…

"How do we get up there?" Mint asked in frustration. They stared up at the ship. It was seeming pretty impossible. But then again, they'd saved the world once before and they could do it

again!

"Is it possible to teleport inside?" Lettuce looked over at Pai.

He shook his head. "I wouldn't know where I was going."

Kisshu rolled his eyes. "Let's give it a try anyways, Pai."

Pai didn't even look over. "Making random decisions increases the likelihood of failure."

Tart stood inbetween Pudding and Lettuce. "Oh whatever."

"Taruto!"

Tart disappeared in a teleport with Lettuce and Pudding.

Pai sighed. "Foolish child. Where the HECK has he gone to?"

Kish thought for a moment. To teleport you basically had to visualise in your mind where you wanted to go and will yourself there. It took some practice. "He's gone to wherever we were

taken to." He looked up and smirked. "Let's go, Pai."

In a second teleport Kish vanished along with Ichigo and Mint.

Zakuro looked over at Pai. "Let's go!"

Pai nodded and teleported himself and Zakuro onto the Supporter's ship.

/)/)  
>(0.0 )<br>(')(') O

In that same dark room that the three aliens had been taken to, all seven of them appeared in the empty space.

Ichigo stumbled. She hadn't quite gotten used to teleporting yet and standing up during it made it a whole lot worse. She felt a sudden dizziness and nearly fell flat on her face.

"No time for that, kitty-cat."

Ichigo sighed heavily and slowly opened her eyes, but didn't say anything. It was bad enough that Kisshu had been the one to catch her. He pulled her back up.

"Pudding can't see a _thing, _nanoda!" Pudding breathed from somewhere in the darkness.

Visibility was indeed almost zero for most of them. Pai, Kisshu and Tart came from a world where they'd had to live underground all their lives, so their species had evolved better vision

since leaving Earth (hence their unusually bright eyes). Ichigo on the other hand was part feline; meaning her sight in the dark was greatly improved so long as her DNA was still infused

with the Wildcat's.

Pai swept his eyes over the room and saw the faint outline of something on the far side of the room which stood out against the walls. He floated towards it while the others tried to make

their way in the dark.

There was a raised orb which hovered above a rectangular stand, much like one of the machines in the dimension that had been used during previous missions. It would be easy enough for

Pai to use one of these devices.

He raised his hand over it and the orb lit up in bright lilac and blue. Geometric shapes covered the surface. Pai groaned slightly. He would need a password to get the information out of this

thing and he was pretty sure _this _wasn't the spaceship that had brought him to earth the first time. No, it couldn't be. He didn't remember this room.

The thing bleeped and demanded a passcode. Three boxes showed up and Pai had no idea where to start.

"What are you going to do?" Tart came up behind him.

Pai shook his head. "I don't know."

Taruto took a look at the boxes. "Is it in code?"

A realisation came over him. How did he not notice that before? All supporter ships had passcodes which were in code: the ancient symbols used when their ancestors had lived on earth. It

was the earliest language. He muttered something about being an idiot and was ready to type something, but hesitated. "What in code?"

"Try something to do with Deep Blue." Tart suggested.

Pai typed in the three swirly symbols that in ancient language made out 'Master Deep Blue'. There was a moment of tension as the computer went over what had just been typed. It blinked

orange, meaning the code had not worked. As usual on the supporter ships, they had four chances before the entire spacecraft went into a stop and everyone on board would be on high

alert looking for the intruders.

Pai entered another password: 'Deep Blue-Sama', trying to ignore everyone else who had made their way towards him. Orange flash, two attempts left.

The next go he entered the symbol for the planet Earth; which was made up of the three symbols for water, earth and sky. It had been the code for their other ship in the reclaiming mission

(and on their own), so why shouldn't it be used here? Another orange flash told him it wasn't being used here.

Pai ran a hand through his hair. One more attempt. If they wanted to get to the aqua and save the earth they had to get this right.

He tried to think of how old this ship must be. It couldn't be very old and from what he'd seen it was fairly modern. If it _was _new and because supporter ships _were_made for the current

leader, then Indigo would have set a custom password himself. _Fool! _That was why Planet Earth was used on the previous ships, Deep Blue had been the leader and the followers had

entered his home planet. Great. One more try. Pai felt nervous and incredibly pressured as he guessed the last password.

He used three syllable symbols: 'In-di-go', and waited as the computer took in the password.

Everyone was silently praying. _Get this right, PLEASE get this right!  
><em>  
>Wrong.<p>

Suddenly the orb flashed bright orange and all around them there was a deafening alarm sounding. The entire room lit up and for a moment the people inside were blinded after taking so

long for their eyes to adjust in the dark.

Pai put his hand over his face to see better through the lights and looked around again. He saw a door to the left of the orb computer. "There!"

No one was really sure what to do until Pai started racing towards the door. The others followed through it and found themselves in a white, narrow corridor.

"Where are we going?" Ichigo asked, wondering whether to stop before talking.

For a moment no one responded, it was hard to have a conversation whilst running down narrow walkways.

"We need to find the control rooms." Taruto answered. "A ship this size could have many."

Ichigo decided not to point out they had no idea where they were going.

"UH! Pai!"

They all paused and looked back. Tart had found a lit-up map of the ship on one of the walls.

Pai moved back and examined it. They were on what was called the first quarter section of the ship, the main control room was on the opposite, but there was a large oval shaped room in

back-right of the ship with four symbols marking it. 'Mew-Aqua-Launch'. That was where the Aqua was kept.

"Ok," Pai looked up and down the corridor after taking a moment to memorize the route to take. _Straight, right, left, straight, right, left, straight… _He repeated this in his head until it stuck

and took off in front of the others.

They didn't have to go far before someone stopped them.

"HEY!"

They bumped right into a woman in a lab coat who must have been making her way to a chimera-test room. She started yelling. "SECURITY!"

Kish walked up to her and covered her mouth. "Shut up, will you!"

Pai shot him a look. "Kisshu! We've no time for this!"

Kish sighed and let the alien woman go. She ran off the moment she was free.

The only problem was that now they'd been seen she'd get someone in security down here now. They couldn't go straight ahead the way they'd planned. "Damn it!" Pai sighed. "This way."

Now they took another route through a side door. This led to more passages, more corridors… until finally…

The group burst through the double doors ahead of them and found themselves in what seemed to be the main control room. It was circular, huge and had an oval desk in the centre which

was surrounded by chairs and had countless panels and screens and controls. The room was entirely white and had a glow to it and on one of the sides was a huge window with a perfect

view of earth.

All around the desks and controls the people working there stood up and stared at the intruders.

They were all Deep Blue supporters; their cloaks proved it, and they all seemed to back away slightly. Except for two.

"Pai! You dare show your face again!"

That alien woman with the long, flowing hair and shimmery dress floated above the console.

Pudding decided to be her usual brave self and stomped forward. "WHERE IS THE MEW AQUA, NANODA?"

Before anyone could tell Pudding to back down another alien appeared. "The Mew Mews."

Lettuce felt a stone in her throat when that second alien teleported in. It was the one that looked a lot like Pai.

She swallowed and spoke up. "Yes, we're Mew Mews! And we're here to protect the Earth, so _you'd _better step out of our way! Because we're going to save this planet, whatever happens!

You have no rightto do this to our home!"

Lettuce knew everything she'd just said was stupid and utterly pointless, but she didn't care. She wanted to defend earth.

There was a moment of awkward silence. The woman looked down at everyone else in the room. "Leave this to us."

The staff obeyed and quickly scurried out of the control room. The mews and aliens were left there.

The woman spoke again. "You want the Mew Aqua don't you? You want to stop the explosion. Well, first you'll have to get past _this!"  
><em>  
>She took a parasite anima and threw it down to the spot they were standing. It exploded and everyone dodged to avoid it.<p>

From the parasite on the ground rose a gigantic Chimera Anima.

Ichigo stared at it and groaned inside. The anima in front of her was like a grey, swirling creature made of smoke with glowing orange eyes and claws.

She stood there a moment staring at it; she just couldn't take her eyes away!

" MEW ICHIGO!"

"AH!"

The creature shot a ball of orange, glowing energy from its mouth which also exploded violently when it hit the floor. Zakuro pulled her out of the way just in time.

"Thank you, Zakuro-san!"

Zakuro straightened up. "Don't let your guard down, Ichigo, not even for a second." She turned to the anima. "This thing seems fast. ZaCross whip!"

Zakuro held a hand out for her weapon and shot up into the air. She usually attacked first.

"RIBBON… ZAKURO SPEAR!"

The beam of purple light shot from the cross and headed towards the anima. It found its way to the neck and wrapped itself around tightly, only instead of weakening the beast all it had to

do was move and the whip went straight through it.

Zakuro landed on the ground with her cross in her hand and stared open-mouthed at the anima. "No effect."

The other mews stepped into help.

"RIBBON… LETTUCE RUSH!"

"RIBBON PUDDING RING… INFERNO!"

"RIBBON MINT ECHO!"

Ichigo watched, stunned as each attack they had made little effect.

The pudding ring got there first, but the anima could just float away straight through the jelly. The lettuce rush and mint echo seemed to do minor damage, but not enough to harm it.

"HO-RAI-DEN!"

"KUU-RAI-SEN-PUU-JIN!"

Again, Pai and tart's attacks turned useless. The click-clack weapon had spun straight through it, leaving a slight smoky trail and if anything Pai's electrical attack only _gave _the anima more

power.

With this extra energy it emitted another glowing fireball.

The aliens above laughed. "Seems we're doing okay here, have fun saviours of Earth."

Ichigo looked up to see the aliens teleport out of the room. They probably didn't want to be anywhere _near _this anima.

"What do we _do?" _Pudding cried out.

"I don't know," Mint answered. "But we need to get to the Mew Aqua!"

Ichigo looked around and remembered. "I can feel it."

Lettuce looked at her. "What?"

"I can feel when the Mew Aqua is near, that's how I found it in the last battle." She said. "I need to know where the Mew Aqua room is."

Mint frowned. "So just like last time we fend off the Chimera Anima and you go in the search for Mew Aqua to save the world."

Ichigo nodded. "Yeah."

Mint thought for a moment then shrugged. "Fair enough, I'll hold this off for a while."

She leapt into the air and prepared to attack again.

"RIBBON MINTO ECHO!"

Pai pointed towards the doors on the other side of the room. "Through there you'll get there easier."

She nodded. "Ok."

The other mews also nodded and went to attack again, as did Pai and Tart.

Kisshu looked at Ichigo. "Do have any idea where you're going?"

"No." she sighed. "But I have to."

"But what if Indigo's there."

Ichigo thought. She hadn't thought of that, but smiled brightly. "I'll do my best to defeat him."

With that she took off towards the doors. Kish shook his head. He couldn't see her killing anyone.

Instead of pointing this out, he decided to make himself useful and helped with the battle.

Meanwhile Ichigo raced to the other side, but the chimera anima kept getting in the way.

Every so often someone would fire and it would leap backwards into her path.

"AH!"

A trail of smoke came through with the click-clack weapon. The weapon hit her and the smoke choked her.

She felt the pain in her arm, it was cut and bleeding, but she couldn't focus on that. She couldn't stop coughing and was eventually brought to the floor.

"ICHIGO!"

Ichigo sighed. _Great.  
><em>  
>Looking up her coughing from behind had made the creature uneasy. It turned and glared at her. It opened its mouth…<br>_  
>Great! <em>She thought. _I'm gunna be killed by an anima on an alien ship… without saving earth… I hope they make it without me…  
><em>  
>The glowing ball sped out…<br>_  
>…and I hope Aoyama-kun will understand. But he'll be so mad… Aoyama-kun. Aoyama-kun.<br>_  
>She wasn't really sure what was happening, but her thoughts went back to Masaya and she was aware of a speeding orb of smoke and fire coming towards her. She could feel the heat.<br>_  
>Masaya?<br>_  
>She opened her eyes and saw nothing but the colour pink, followed by the colour blue, then pink, then blue and then- Masaya?<p>

In a sphere of glowing, blue light Aoyama Masaya appeared out of thin air and stood in front of her.

"Ichigo?"

"A-Aoyama?"

"Ichigo! AAAH!"

"AOYAMA!"

Ichigo screamed as the ball that had been coming for _her _hit him instead. He yelled out for a minute and then dropped to the floor.

"MASAYA! ARE YOU OKAY? SAY SOMETHING!" Ichigo leaned over him. "AOYAMA!"

In the background she heard the anima roar as the others distracted it, but she was distracted herself. How could she save earth when her boyfriend had just died?  
><em><br>No, he's not dead. _She told herself. _He's not- he can't be-  
><em>  
>"Kitten?"<p>

Ichigo growled as Kisshu teleported behind her. _"DON'T call me that!"_

"Ichigo?"

He knelt down with her. "Go."

"WHAT?"

"Go."

She started crying. _"NO! I can't leave! He's-"  
><em>  
>"And after all the fuss you had about saving Earth, don't you think he'd want it to be safe?"<p>

"But I- I can't-" she choked. She couldn't even finish her sentence.

Kisshu pulled her up onto her feet. "Go, if we get the Mew Aqua maybe we can revive him."

Ichigo swallowed her tears. "R-really? Y-you'd help him survive?"

He nodded and wiped away one of her tears with his hand.

She felt slightly better and looked down at Masaya on the floor. He'd want the Earth to be safe.

He loved Earth and the environment so much, so she could help to protect it.

Feeling stronger, Ichigo wiped her face and headed to the corridor.


	16. Fighting Indigo and the Smoke Beast

**Yay! Chapter 16 is up earlier than normal. I'd just like to say that I've only just added titles to my chapters... and they're awful. I do NOT do well at chapter names _at all  
><em>so yeah, they're pretty awful so just ignore them if you want ^-^ Anyway, enjoy!**

Every step Ichigo took made her more nervous and each step she felt another pain in her heart.  
><em><br>Why, Masaya, why?  
><em>  
>She wasn't sure how far she'd have to go or how far she'd gone, but she was sure that the Mew Aqua was here somewhere; it was just a case of finding it.<p>

She'd had to make her way through the maze of corridors in the ship without being seen and it wasn't easy, especially with everyone on the lookout for them.

But she was so close! Everytime she got to a certain point she'd feel as if there was Mew Aqua just on the other side of the wall… the wall that didn't have a door. So she'd spent ages trying

to find a way in and wasn't succeeding. At all.

Eventually she came to a halt. In front of her there were three more corridors leading in different directions.

"Come on," Ichigo whispered. "Show me the way."

She closed her eyes. _I have to find it; I _have _to find it…  
><em>  
>Ugh! This wasn't <em>working!<br>_  
>Ichigo swallowed and thought again. Didn't Mew Aqua mainly work if you were emotionally moved? <em>Masaya… Masaya! <em>The image of him popped into her head. Oh, why? _Why _did it have to

be like this? And after all that had happened. _Aoyama-kun!  
><em>  
>Another tear escaped from her closed eye and fell down onto her cheek. She opened them to find herself glowing a bright, neon blue. "Mew Aqua…"<p>

Now she was sure where to go.

Ichigo followed her instincts and took the passage to the right. She walked down it confidently.  
><em><br>I'm going to save the Earth. I am _going _to save the earth!  
><em>  
>"Huh-"<p>

Ichigo stopped at the end of the corridor. In front of her was a grand, large double-door entrance. Her hand glowed even more when she went to push it open. Mew Aqua was definitely in

here.

With a deep breath, Ichigo pushed the doors open and walked inside.

Now she was in, she wasn't sure what to do.

The room was grey and everything seemed like steel, there were no windows, no chairs… just a glass cylinder that stood on its end and reached from the floor to the ceiling with a control

orb in front of it. But inside the cylinder was definitely a Mew Aqua. The orb of glowing, blue light inside was definitely the largest she'd ever seen. Well, Pai _had _said the biggest response

was from in here.

She figured she'd have to use the computer somehow, but she wasn't sure how to work these.

Ichigo waked across the room up to it. "Mew Aqua."

She lightly touched the glass. How could such a good healer be such a dangerous destroyer?

"You have arrived, Mew Ichigo."

A calm voice spoke from behind and the doors were slammed shut. Ichigo turned to see Indigo, the leader of the Deep Blue supporters behind her. "You! How do I stop this machine?"

Indigo raised an eyebrow (at least she think he did, his eyebrows were the same sandy colour as his hair so it was hard to tell). "Foolish human." He muttered. "Do you believe I would just

stop all my plans for one pathetic Earthling? No. You will not shut off my Mew Aqua launch."

Indigo didn't take his eyes off her as he pulled out a long, shining, blue sword. Ichigo took a deep breath and prepared to fight.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

"_AAAH!"  
><em>  
>Mint's screams echoed around the room as the smoke beast Chimera Anima whooshed above her head. She dropped to the floor, put her hands over her head and held in a yell as she felt<p>

the rush of air go over her. When it was over she held up her head. "I'm… _Not _dead?"

Mint stood up and looked to her left. The anima was fighting with Tart right now and everybody else was helping from above. She'd have to thank him for distracting it, if he hadn't she'd

have ended up like Aoyama.

"Mint onee-chan!"

She looked down at the youngest Mew rushing up to her. Pudding tugged on her hand. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, Pudding, I'm fine." She smiled. "Now let's go help!"

"Let's go, nanoda!"

The two of them ran towards the fight, going sideways so they didn't disturb it and end up as prey themselves. Mint leapt up into the air and held her bow. "Now, Pudding!"

Below Pudding stood in front of the smoke beast and defended Taruto. "RIBBON PUDDING RING… INFERNO!"

The anima would only be held in the pudding ring for a few seconds. Mint had to act now.

"RIBBON MINTO-"

"Not so fast."

Mint recognised Kiko's voice immediately. The alien teleported behind her and held his sword up to her neck.

She groaned. "Ugh, _you _again!"

The blonde alien gripped his sword tighter. _"Yes _me again. Now, are you prepared to leave quietly, or do I have to _force_you out of my way?"

Mint sighed and rolled her eyes. "I don't have time for this."

"Then I'll end it quickly for you."

Mint froze; she was too scared to move now as he raised his weapon. This was it, how could she escape now?

She closed her eyes and prepared herself to be cut through. But Kiko was interrupted.

"What do you think you're doing now?"

Kiko spoke through gritted teeth in frustration. "KISSHU!"

Mint opened her eyes and sighed with relief. She never thought she'd say this, but she was so _thrilled _to see the irritating alien right now.

Kisshu floated to the side, grabbed the sword and pulled it away from Mint. She took that chance to fly back down to a safer level.

"Why do you always _interrupt me?" _Kiko asked.

Kisshu smirked. "You always get in the way."

Kiko growled and held his sword with both hands.

Kish got ready for another fight and summoned his zai. "Dragon Swords!"

The sword swung down, narrowly missing his face and he held up with swords to block the attack.

There was a sound of metal scraping on metal and clanging as Kish blocked Kiko's violent attacks.

They were in mid-air now and above the battle below, but they didn't care. They hated each other and now one was going to finish the other off.

No more chances. Kish repeated this in his head. _No more chances... He wants me to die, so I'm gonna have to fight back. It's him or me._

"HAAAH!"

Kisshu yelled out as he stabbed the air with a dagger. His opponent dodged it and he tried again.

Everytime Kiko was agile enough to swoop easily out of harm's way. Kisshu yelled again and sent a silver sword in Kiko's direction.

He again dodged it, but that was the idea. As soon as he'd dodged Kish threw the second whilst Kiko was recovering.

This time it slashed his left shoulder. His cloak was ripped and blood stained the fabric.

He was red in the face and glared at Kish. "You…"

Kiko flung off his cloak and threw it to the ground. Underneath his outfit was very similar to Pai's, but it was tight, not baggy and the colour was aqua-blue and made of shiny material. The

opaque section around his waist was like a teal colour and unlike Pai he had no armbands.

"Didn't know that was your style." Kish commented. With another smirk he brought his zai back to him.

Kiko growled angrily at him and swung his sword sideways, aiming for Kish's sides. He was swinging it pretty violently and it took some effort to get out of the way in time. Slowly Kish was

being pushed from the centre of the room to the edge as he backed away from the sharp blade. There had to be a reason why that sword was so weird and twisty, but he didn't particularly

want to find out.

Kish held up his swords and struggled to defend himself. When Kiko was mad he was incredibly strong. He pushed up on the thick blade and swooped another few inches backwards. How

was he going to win this fight?

Another clash as the sword hit the zai. Kisshu groaned as he put all his weight into getting free, even though it wasn't working too well.

Desperate for help, Kisshu glanced down at the Chimera Anima. Everyone was too distracted to notice him. If Ichigo were here the fight would be over in no time and someone could _help_

him!

But, he didn't exactly want her back right now, not when it had taken that long to get her to leave. Given the choice she'd probably still be here sulking and moping about her boyfriend

instead of saving the _entire earth!  
><em>  
>Kish saw the body of Masaya out of the corner of his eye. Back when he'd been on Earth the first time he'd been glad to see the Blue Knight in that state. He'd have even happily got him<p>

himself. So why wasn't he happy to see him here now?

"AAAH!"

Kish knew he shouldn't be deep in thought when he was fighting, but he couldn't help himself.

He looked again at the burnt Aoyama still led on the floor. He'd gotten in the way… But, wait, why was he here? Why... why did he suddenly appear like that? In an orb of blue light? Like he

had done all those times, all those times when he was the Blue Knight. _The Blue Knight…  
><em>  
>Oh, of course! What an idiot! How had he not realised this before? Kish mentally hit himself.<p>

He and Ichigo must still have a mental connection. Aoyama was part of Deep Blue, and being revived must have allowed him to keep some of his original powers. The connection that had let

him appear just in the nick in time when he was the Blue Knight had been kept. _Ooh…  
><em>  
>Then Kisshu's thoughts replayed the scene of his latest death. The anima didn't like things from behind it so had attacked.<p>

Kish smirked. This gave him an idea.

He was almost to the wall now, and if he could just get Kiko _behind _the anima then his plan should work.

Another swing of the sword and another swoop backwards – great he was at the wall now – and he floated down whilst trying to keep the sword a fair distance away with his zais.

"You're cornered, Kisshu." Kiko said to him.

Kish floated down to the floor and stood normally. Kiko stood in front with his sword up to Kish's chest. "There's no going back."

Kisshu smirked again. "No, there isn't."

"Is that all you can say?"

"Yeah."

"Well, then, I suppose this is it. Though, I'd have liked to see you fail a bit more with that Strawberry Mew."

Kish tried to keep a straight face and not to snap something back.

Kiko pulled back his sword, ready to stab him with it. Wow, Kisshu really hoped his plan worked.

"KISSHU!"

Tart's voice echoed around the room. The two of them looked back and saw why.

The smoke beast anima had heard them from behind and had turned to attack them. The anima opened its mouth wide and sent out a ball of searing heat and smoke.

Kish took that moment to teleport to safety, leaving Kiko cornered.

In an instant it was over. The orb hit the blonde alien, burst into flames and he dropped just like Aoyama had. His sword glowed white with heat and smoked slightly as it hit the floor.

Pai spoke first. "This is our chance. NOW!"

The mews nodded and understood. Now they could attack from behind with a greater chance of success.

"-MINT ECHO!"

"-LETTUCE RUSH!"

"-PUDDING RING INFERNO!"

"-ZAKURO SPEAR!"

"FUU HYOU SEN!"

"HISSATSU HOURAI-KYUU!"

With the attacks rushing towards it, the anima growled and bellowed before vanishing in a cloud of steam. Then it was silent.

"Is it gone?" Lettuce asked.

There was a pause before anyone answered. Eventually Pai spoke up. "Yes."

"Phew, that was a tough one, nanoda!" Pudding chirped in her usual cheerful way.

"Yes," Zakuro said. "So we must all be on high alert. We'd better get looking for Mew Ichigo."

Kisshu suddenly remembered Ichigo wasn't there. "Koneko-chan!" He took off towards the door.

"Where do you think you're going?" Pai questioned.

"I'm going to find Ichigo! I'm going to see if she's ok!"

The older alien sighed. "If you must,"

Zakuro nodded. "We'll go too. We'll split up. I'll take Pudding and Mint with me, Pai, you go with Lettuce and Taruto."

They all agreed and made their way into the maze of corridors.

()()  
>(0.0)<br>O(")")

"UH!"

Ichigo forced herself to keep going. In the otherwise empty room apart from the Mew Aqua, there was nowhere for her to hide or take cover.

She was stood near the exit, but she wasn't planning on going anywhere, and she had her Strawberry bell blasting out attacks towards her enemy. It didn't do much good though; he had

some sort of shield from energy attacks that protected him in a bubble of light.

Indigo every so often would teleport around the room to confuse her and when he was close enough swipe her with his sword.

"AH!" Ichigo screamed pain as the blue blade made another cut in her, this time on the left shoulder.

Ichigo took a short moment to look at it. _Oh god… _she thought. _It seems pretty deep…  
><em>  
>Suddenly a rush of air swept past her as the sword just missed her head.<p>

Ignoring the pain in her shoulder, Ichigo stood up onto her feet and took out her weapon, hoping to catch him in a teleport. "STRAWBERRY SURPRISE!"

The beam of pink light whizzed towards Indigo and it seemed to have some effect. His shield wouldn't work in a teleport and the Strawberry Surprise caught him.

There was a roar of anger as he appeared in front of her and cleverly swished his sword in just about every direction. It got her in several places, but none of the injuries were too deep,

although they stung a little.

She growled as she sent out attacks, one after the other. Again, no effect.

Ugh! This guy was hopeless! Indigo was going back to his confusion tactic; popping up in different places. She had no idea where to aim. She had to spin and move fast, but she was wasting

energy and only tiring herself.  
><em><br>"AAAH!" _Ichigo let out an ear-splitting scream as the alien teleported behind her and she felt his sword cut through her side. She fell to her knees and felt the energy drain out of her.

Indigo stepped in front of her. "Humans. It's a wonder Deep Blue-sama wasn't able to finish you off. But now you _will _be gone. As will the rest of your pathetic species. You have failed to

save the earth, Mew Strawberry and now everyone down there will suffer because you couldn't defeat me." He sighed. "Well I guess this was to be expected."

Ichigo slid onto her side and put her head down on the floor. She didn't care what he was saying, if she couldn't do this then her friends could.

"And now, the final blow."

She closed her eyes and waited for it. It turns out she didn't have to wait for long, she passed out before he could do anything.


	17. Revival

"_AAAH!"  
><em>  
>"Ichigo!"<p>

Kisshu heard the scream coming from further down the corridor. He quickened his pace and tried to find the right room, but there were so _many!  
><em>  
>"Humans."<p>

Kish stopped when he heard a familiar voice. He must be close, he could hear Indigo talking.

He kept his ears listening for anything else and slowly edged towards the nearest door.

The voice wasn't too clear, but it was getting louder and he could make out more of it.

"-pathetic species. You failed to save the earth, Mew Strawberry and now everyone down there will suffer because you couldn't defeat me." Kish heard him sigh. "Well I guess this was to be expected."

Now he got _really _worried, why was he talking and why wasn't Ichigo fighting back? What was wrong with her?

Kisshu moved quickly towards the doors ahead of him. There was a panel of glass that crossed the middle and he peered through it. _Oh no! Ichigo!  
><em>  
>He saw her lying on the floor with Indigo stood over her. He could only see her from the back, but it didn't look good. She was injured and it was pretty obvious she was bleeding. He wasn't even sure if<p>

she was conscious.

"And now, the final blow."

Kish watched as Indigo raised his blue sword and was about to kill her.

That was the moment he stepped in. Kisshu burst through the double doors.

"INDIGO!"

"Kisshu."

Indigo lowered his sword and stared at the alien in the launch room.

"What are you doing here? Kiko should've finished you off."

"Kiko's dead. The Chimera Anima your followers sent after us got him."

Indigo sighed and muttered something about Kiko being a failure. Then he spoke up. "What do you want?"

Kish smirked. "Well that depends. Are you going to let Ichigo go? Or the Earth? What about this whole plan to destroy the earth when we've got a perfect planet ourselves?"

"You can't just keep using the same excuse all the time." He replied, raising his voice a little.

Kish moved forward. "Let her go."

"Don't order me about."

"Let. Her. Go." He repeated.

Indigo glared at him. "I do believe last time we met, I gave you a death threat." He raised the sword again. "You _will _die."

Kisshu grabbed his own swords and jumped out of the way as lightning struck the spot where he had been standing.

He focused on Indigo and crossed his zai. Energy fizzled through them and Kish launched a ball of green energy in Indigo's direction.

It exploded on the ground, but the powerful leader's defence shield blocked all energy attacks. That meant he'd have to fight with his zai up close.

Kish teleported closer to Indigo and tried to avoid getting stabbed, he didn't particularly want to do _that _again.

The metal weapons clanged against each other and even though Kisshu was skilled with using zai swords, Indigo's far larger one was far more dangerous and could do a _lot _more damage.

The opponent swung his sword and Kish had to float into the air to avoid it. He then swerved to get to the side and managed to make a scar diagonally across Indigo's back.

Now the enemy was angry. He used his word again and moved it insanely fast, but only managed to make a small slash in Kish's arm as he was far more agile and was floating mid-air.

Next was the general sword fight; attacking, blocking, attacking, blocking… The occasional lightning bolt being thrown…  
><em><br>CHANG!  
><em>  
>Another clash. Kish pushed the sword off and quickly spread his arms out straight so Indigo now had two symmetrical cuts on his arms. He growled and the blade of his sword came down fast. Kish just<p>

missed it, getting away with only a slight tear in his sleeve.

"There's no point in avoiding it," Indigo said darkly.

The sword came down again and hit the floor, a dent was left and the stone chipped.  
><em><br>CHANG!  
><em>  
>Kisshu crossed his zai to block the sword. He held it above his face and tried to push it off.<p>

"I won't let you take the earth and I _won't _let you kill Ichigo!"

"It's inevitable now. No matter what happens, _I _will follow Deep Blue-sama until the end."

"AARGH!" He pushed off the sword and charged towards his opponent, who received some small rips on the front of his cloak. Kish then quickly ducked to the right before Indigo could get him back.

Indigo fully expected to get Kish, but missed and as he was using his sword with full strength he found himself hurtling forwards and losing his balance for a moment.

Kish took that moment. He teleported in front of his enemy and stabbed him in the stomach with his zai.

Indigo gasped in pain and looked into the pair of golden eyes. Kish pulled out his swords and Indigo stumbled backwards.

He fell onto the floor and didn't move.

Kisshu looked over at the old leader of the Deep Blue supporters who now lay on the stone tiles dead and everything around him was surprisingly calm. He took a breath for a moment. Fighting had

drained some of his energy.

Suddenly the silence was interrupted by a loud alarm. It could've been the alarm for intruders, which would mean that the others had been spotted, but this was different; this was lower and not as loud.  
><em><br>BLEEP!  
><em>  
>Behind the computer on the aqua machine started to flash.<p>

Kish suddenly realised. _The Mew Aqua!  
><em>  
>He rushed to the orb computer. It was counting down from thirty and was currently at thirty-seven. "Oh," he mumbled to himself. "Great."<p>

Pai was normally the technical guy, the computer person who always did this sort of thing.

Kish randomly touched the orb. Three boxes came up and demanded a password and above them read: 'Mew Aqua Launch – Cancel'. Perfect. Where to start?

Again the password had to be made up of ancient code symbols. He had four attempts and began immediately.

'Mew Aqua'

'PASSWORD INCORRECT – 3 ATTEMPTS'

'Reclaim'

'PASSWORD INCORRECT – 2 ATTEMPTS'

'Planet Earth'

'PASSWORD INCORRECT – 1 ATTEMPT'

He groaned in frustration and tried desperately to think. For once it was _him _who had to save the earth.

Kish looked around for some inspiration, or _anything! _But all he saw was Indigo (except that password hadn't worked before) and Ichigo lying on the floor.  
><em><br>Ichigo…  
><em>  
>"Mew Ichigo!"<p>

A sudden realisation came over him and he typed in his last password: 'Mew Mew'.

There was a pause. And then…

'PASSWORD ACCEPTED – MEW AQUA LAUNCH DISABLED'

Kisshu breathed a sigh of great relief and grinned as the message was then repeated over the ship's speaker system. The Earth was safe.

Then he saw what had inspired him. "Ichigo!"

He ran over to Ichigo who was still unconscious. Well, at least she wasn't _dead_.

Kisshu knelt down and looked at the wound she was lying on. It was on her right side and was very deep, the blood staining her pink dress. There was another deep-ish gash on her left shoulder, but it

didn't look life-threatening. These two wounds were accompanied by little, tiny ones on her arms, but again they weren't something to be worried about.

He put a hand on her shoulder and tried to wake her. "Ichigo! _Ichigo!"  
><em>  
>When that didn't do anything he shook her gently. This time she stirred.<p>

She breathed out and half-opened her eyes. "K…is…shu,"

Kish felt relieved and spoke cheerfully. "Good to see you, koneko-chan!"

Ichigo felt too weak to even roll her eyes at him. "Where's Indigo?"

He looked back across the room and she saw his dead body near the Mew Aqua machine.

"You- you got him?"

"Yup, now let's see if you can get up,"

Kish pulled Ichigo up. She gasped in pain because of the wound on her side.

When she was up on her feet and leaning on Kisshu for support, her mew pendant bleeped.  
><em><br>"Mew Ichigo?" _It was Mint's voice.

He took it off for her and spoke through. "Where are the rest of you?"

Mint didn't sound happy to hear him. _"Kisshu?"_ she snapped. _"What are you doing answering? Where's Ichigo?"_

"She's here, she's fine. Now I'll ask again: Where are you?"  
><em><br>"NO! I won't respond to a useless, ignorant-"_

_"Ah-hem, Mew Zakuro here, we're near a secondary control room, are you still in the Mew Aqua Launch room?"  
><em>  
>"Yeah,"<br>_  
>"We'll be there shortly."<br>_  
>The pendant stopped bleeping and Ichigo took it back.<p>

|)|)  
>(0.0)<br>(")(")0

It wasn't long before the others found their way in.

Pai took one look at Indigo and turned on Kish. "Kisshu, what have you done now?"

Kish raised a hand in defence, though not very well with Ichigo still leaning on him. "Hey! What did you expect, a formal warning?"

"Ichigo!"

The Mews ran up to their leader and helped her. She sat on the floor and did her best to convince the others she was ok. Of course they were having none of it.

Zakuro looked at her sternly. "Ichigo, you are _not _ok!"

"Not now, but I'm sure you'll get better onee-chan, nanoda!"

Ichigo smiled back weakly at the yellow mew in front of her. "Thanks, Pudding."

Meanwhile the aliens were stood admiring the orb of Mew Aqua that levitated inside the cylinder chamber.

"That's the biggest Mew Aqua I've ever seen!" Tart exclaimed.

"It is a remarkable amount." Pai stated.

From behind them a timid voice spoke. "M-maybe we could heal Mew Ichigo with its power?"

Lettuce looked hopefully at Pai, but seemed to ignore the other two. "Could we, Pai-san?"

He thought for a moment. "Maybe…"

Pai walked up to the computer and started to type away.

Taruto looked with curiosity. "What are you doing?"

As usual Pai didn't respond. He was busy doing all the technical work.

At a certain point he stopped. "Kisshu, what was the password?"

"Mew Mew."

Pai typed in the symbols and then looked up at the cylinder. There was a bleeping sound and part of the glass rotated to reveal a gap and the Mew Aqua.

He held out his hand and the aqua floated into his palm. It was strange, it didn't feel like there was anything there except a warm glow.

"Lettuce,"

Lettuce jumped when he said her name. "Yes!"

"Here."

She nervously took it from his hand and went back to Ichigo and the other mews. "Ichigo! Take this!"

Ichigo looked confused. "Wait, whaa-?"

As soon as Lettuce was close enough, half of the mew aqua orb split off and a bright, blue light surrounded the injured girl.

Ichigo had her mouth hung open in amazement as she felt her body grow warmer and warmer, followed by a tickling sensation as her cuts healed and her deep injuries close.

Once the aqua had done its work the blue light vanished and Ichigo was left without even a scratch. The only noticeable thing was that the effect of the mew aqua had left her skin with a beautiful, visible

glow. She looked at the spots where her wounds had been. "What? They're gone?"

"What did you expect?" Mint folded her arms, but she was secretly glad her friend was ok. They _all _were.

Just as she was beginning to feel happy, Ichigo remembered something. "Aoyama-kun!"

She got up and sped out of the room. The others followed.

"Lettuce!"

Lettuce paused at the door at the sound of Kisshu's voice.

"I'll take it." He told her and held out his hand.

She thought for a moment, but eventually gave him the Mew Aqua.

"Thank you."

()()  
>(O.o)<br>(")(")?

"AOYAMA-KUN! _AOYAMA-KUNN!"  
><em>  
>Ichigo ran through into the control room at full speed. She practically <em>threw <em>herself to the floors she could sit beside her Masaya. _"Aoyama-kun…"_ A tear dropped from her eye.

The others surrounded her.

"Ichigo," Zakuro said to her calmly. "We can't stay here forever. With the launch out of action the supporter's ships will probably be leaving soon."  
><em><br>"But I can't just LEAVE him!" _she gulped through her tears.

"We may have to."  
><em><br>"NO! NO, NO, no..!"  
><em>  
>She put her head in her hands and cried. Around her everyone was unsure of what to do next.<p>

"Ichigo,"

She was aware of someone knelt next to her, and by the sounds of the voice she was pretty sure it was Kish. "What?"

"Use the rest of this."

Ichigo opened her eyes to see him holding out the other half of the Mew Aqua. She looked at him in shock. "Kisshu?"

Kisshu grinned. "I said as much, didn't I, kitty cat?"

She wondered for a second whether to take it or not, after all the normal Kish wouldn't do that, but then again, this _was _a better version of him.

In the end she decided she was being silly and took it. Once she placed it over Masaya the aqua shone and surrounded him in the same light that had healed _her. _It pulsated over him, working to bring

life back into his body and after a few seconds the light vanished and his burnt skin returned to normal. As did his smile.

"A-Aoyama-kun?"

Masaya started to come round. "I-Ichigo?"

"MASAYA!"

Before he was even fully recovered, Ichigo pulled him into a tight hug.

The others smiled happily at the two of them and Kisshu and Ichigo caught each other's eyes.

She whispered to him. "Thank you."


	18. Goodbye for now!

**Thanks to everybody who commented, favourited, subscribed and read this story ~ Nya!**

* * *

><p>Pai closed up the section of the control panel he'd been working on and tapped a few buttons on one of the screens. He looked up. "Kisshu aren't you supposed to be helping?"<p>

The alien to his left leant back in his chair and shrugged. "Maybe."

Pai sighed and muttered a comment about uselessness or something.

Kisshu ran a hand through his green hair. "Have you got the cloaking device up yet?"

"No."

"Won't we be seen?"

With a groan Pai started to set up the shield surrounding their spaceship again.

Taruto came into the room. "Aren't we supposed to be going soon?"

Kish rolled his eyes. "We were supposed to leave after the supporters left, but _someone _had to make some extra adjustments to the ship. That's right isn't it, genius?"

"Yes, that's right." Pai sighed. "But it's absolutely necessary."

"No, it's _not."  
><em>  
>"Yes it is!" he snapped. "If I can use this technology from the Supporter's ship then we'll be able to reduce the time it takes to travel to and from Earth."<p>

Tart tilted his head. "How much? A flight takes about 2 or 3 months."

"If we install this properly, then it'll only take about a week." Pai turned back to the panelling.

"So we could visit more often then?" Tart asked hopefully.

Kish smirked and leant back far enough to reach Tart's height. "Awww, what? So you can see the monkey more often?"

The child's face turned red with fury, pink with embarrassment and finally white with shock. "ARGH! YOU TAKE THAT BACK!"

"Never!"

He jumped into the air and floated, making attempts to hit or somehow injure the older alien.

Once again Pai groaned. "Could you _not _do this in the control room?"

Tart landed back on the floor and huffed.

Pai finally finished with the controls and studied them for a moment.

"Any good ideas, genius?" Kish interrupted.

"What?"

"Well, like, shouldn't we get going?"

He hesitated for a moment and then took his regular flying seat. "Yes. Let's go."

He pressed a few buttons, pulled a few levers and the whole ship started up. The lights above them came on and the engines started whirring.

"Wait!" Tart yelled.

"Yes?"

"We have to say goodbye."

()()  
>(0.0)<p>

Ichigo walked slowly to school alone. She was worried about how she would get through today, what with everything that had happened, but it was good she could see Aoyama after he'd recovered.

Although, she was sad when Ryou had told them they'd had no response from the aliens, so they'd probably already repaired their ship and left to their home planet.

It was a shame, she'd have liked to say goodbye again – as did Pudding and Lettuce - especially as she wasn't technically there to say it last time. But still… Maybe now she'd gotten rid of them.

"Hey! Koneko-chan!"

Ugh. Maybe not.

Ichigo turned around. "Kissh-U!"

As soon as she was facing the right way Kisshu took his chance to drop out of the sky. When he was close enough he kissed her like he had when they'd first met.

"AH!"

She stumbled backwards. "What are you DOING?"

"I had to say goodbye, koneko-chan." He smirked.

"I thought you'd left!" Ichigo mumbled.

Kish grinned and levitated slightly off the ground. "Pai had some last-minute technical stuff he wanted to get out of the way. So I thought I'd escape."

She couldn't help but smile. Oh how he hated the technical stuff…

"Kisshu,"

"Yyes?"

Ichigo grinned. "Thank you for helping Aoyama-kun, I know you don't like him."

"That's okay, you'dve killed me if I hadn't. Besides, I suppose you need the Blue Knight."

"Yeah…"

He floated a bit higher. "Well, I've got to go, kitten."

Ichigo stopped smiling. "How far _is _your planet?"

Kish shrugged. "About three galaxies away."

"Oh." What? Why did she feel so down about him leaving all of a sudden?

He smirked and floated down. "But I'll see you again, kitty-cat."

He gave her another kiss and with a final laugh he went up into the sky and left in a teleport, leaving Ichigo stood there.

She wasn't sure whether to be happy or sad, but right now she had a whole day of school to get through and she was sure her Blue Knight would save her from boredom.

(\(|  
>(0.0)<br>0(")(")

Kisshu teleported into his room and grinned to himself at the thought of those last two kisses.

Then he felt it as the ship took off into space.

He wasn't feeling as sad as he thought he'd be when they were going back to their home planet, New Earth, but only because he'd made a promise to himself that he'd go back for his koneko-chan. Even

_if _that Masaya was still there. She would never leave him and he knew it.

With a sigh, Kish settled into his hamock and gazed out the tiny window at the space and the stars. He saw the earth standing out amongst the dark emptiness of space and was reminded of the first time

he'd left, when he'd led there thinking about everything that had happened.

The only difference was that whilst then he hadn't been able to settle his mind to anything, now he was unusually calm.

Kish knew that sooner or later they'd be back to Earth, and that relaxed him more than anything, made him happier than anything and made him positive that once he was home he could return easier to

a normal, alien life.

But until they got home, Kisshu stared out the window. He saw the bright, breathtaking sight of the blue planet. He saw the rich oceans and natural green continents that his ancestors had always

dreamed about. And he was lucky enough to see it. But aside from all that, Kisshu was pretty sure that just over the swirling clouds and lush, green landscapes, he saw a pair of two, pink, feline eyes that

would watch over and protect earth as long as it needed them.

Kish grinned. "Oh, Ichigo."


End file.
